


Powerful (with a Little Bit of Tender)

by polytropic



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Getting Together, Multi, No more fridging, Polyamory, curing the Troubles with the power of basic communication skills, hopefully more respectful treatment of Native mythology than the show's
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-07 17:14:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14675742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polytropic/pseuds/polytropic
Summary: As the Hunter meteor storm nears, Audrey makes several breakthroughs.(A story for everyone who, at some point while watching Haven, sat back and said "Wait, couldn't you just cure the Troubles by...?")





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been a long time coming and I'm so happy to share it with you! A couple quick notes:  
> \- There will be discussion in this fic regarding some of the non-consensual sex that happens in canon (S1Ep5), but no detailed re-hashing of it. Let me know if I should add the "Rape/Non-con" warning for it, I went back and forth on whether it was appropriate vs misleading.  
> \- Part of the point of this fic was to undo all of the unnecessary fridging of my favorite side characters...but I couldn't figure out a way to save Tommy that worked with the timeline. Very sorry, especially if he was your favorite. If I write a sequel, I'll try to work him back in.  
> \- Title is from Janelle Monae's incredible bi anthem "Make Me Feel"

Arla Cogan, serial killer, doesn't mean to save Haven. She has a lot of needs and desires, some of them conflicting (James will love her when he comes back, he has to, and if to make that happen she has to do some things that would make him hate her if he found out, then, well, she was put in an impossible situation and she found an unthinkable solution and that's not her fault--), but that definitely isn't one of them. 

Her objective is, straightforwardly, to solve one problem with another by having Duke Crocker kill Nathan Wournos. Now that she's burned the Tommy face--hah, literally--she has to start thinking about her endgame, and that includes tying up loose ends. With this approach, Nathan is dead, the way he should have been the  _ first _ time she killed him, and Duke is in jail instead of getting in Audrey's way. As a bonus, if Crocker kills Wournos, his Trouble ends, and her husband never has to worry about activating it. It's not elegant but it's better than her plan B (which is to try to get close to Parker by catching that doe-eyed therapist alone and stealing her face). 

There's a family in Haven who creates musical instruments that can compel people, according to Lucy's stories. The last living descendant, Caleb Rutherford, is very cooperative with a little persuading. She disposes of his body, dons his skin, and with the flute he made her marches Crocker over to Wournos' house. 

"It's not going to work, it's not going to work, my curse doesn't work if I don't want to do it," Crocker babbles the entire way. It's too bad this music thing can only move his body, not shut his mouth. 

"Why do you even want to kill Nathan, why do you...oh man you do not want his skin, I promise, he's got weird elbows and he can't feel anything." Ugh, he just doesn't stop.

"Not if you kill him." She hopes that will silence him in horror, but he just shutters his eyes half-closed and smirks. 

"I mean, that won't fix the elbows. Or his upsettingly long neck. Whatever your plan is, it cannot possibly require looking like a giraffe."

She gives in to an angry impulse and pistol-whips him. That's her husband's genetics he's insulting. His head snaps to the side and he pants for a moment; then he  _ keeps talking _ . 

"Okay, okay, you too inexplicably find Nate appealing, fine, no accounting for taste."

  
Thank God, they're at the apartment at last. She was going to leave Crocker alive, pin the Bolt Gun Killer murders on him to tie up that loose end, but he's  _ so annoying _ . She's going to kill him, she decides firmly as she blows another note on the flute and he unwillingly rings the doorbell.

"Duke?" Wournos opens the door, and it's that moment of hesitation that Arla has been counting on. She blows the flute; Crocker's body shoves the knife forward in a fluid, powerful stab. Neither of them had time to say a single word. 

Wournos collapses on his doorstep, blood bubbling from his lips. Crocker screams his name, anguished and disbelieving, which is finally the kind of vocalization she can get behind. She blows another note, makes sure Crocker stays right there and watches him die. She wishes every plan went this smoothly. 

Then her goddamn father-in-law screws everything up. She aimed that stab carefully; he should be helpless, unable to do anything but slowly die. Instead he, impossibly, drags his fingers through his own blood and then clasps them around Crocker's ankle. It's that inability to feel, she realizes. His nerves don't go into shock like a normal person. Damn damn damn.

She blows the flute to force him to stay still and die properly. The minute she does it she realizes her mistake, but it's too late: she is lifted off her feet by a massive impact. She flies through the air and hits the ground so hard her vision blacks out. 

When she can see again, Duke Crocker is holding her in the air with one hand. His eyes are an eerie silver. He looks like the monster she knows he is; that they both are. 

Arla Cogan doesn't live to see her actions save Haven. She's not even alive by the time the paramedics get there for Nathan. 

~~~

Audrey beats the ambulance to Nathan's apartment by about twenty seconds. She stumbles getting out of the car, makes her way to his side in a half-run, half-fall. Duke is there, hunched over him, covered in his blood. He's talking to him, low and constant. Audrey can already tell Nathan is far past the point where talking to him will make any difference. 

"Stay away," Duke snarls, and she almost punches him before she realizes he's not talking to her. The paramedics fall back a step, wary, when they see his eyes. That's a lot of Nathan's blood on his skin, Audrey realizes slowly. She hopes he can't overdose. 

He won't let the paramedics close, but he lets her reach for Nathan's hand. Lets her press her fingers to his bony wrist and sob once, shortly, when there's no pulse. Her mind is moving too slowly. She knows she's supposed to do something now, say something, but all she can do is stare at his still, dear face. 

Duke is still talking. 

"--don't know if that's what you would have wanted, I honestly don't because I don't understand you, I don't understand you at all, but I did it, you know, I killed her and hell if I'll apologize to you, you open your goddamn eyes and wring an apology from me or you're not getting one, Nathan come on please, come on, make me apologize--"

He breaks off, then, and chokes. Presses his lips together, hard, to keep the sounds in, but she can hear them in his throat anyways.

Somehow Duke's crying is what jumpstarts her brain again. 

"Duke. Duke, get Noelle."

He blinks at her. Understanding slowly dawns and he scrambles to his feet, digging in his pocket for his phone. 

"We're idiots, we're both idiots, it's been two weeks since this last happened and it takes us this long to--don't  _ touch _ him!"

The paramedics have checked over the dead pile of skin that houses Arla Cogan and turn once again to Nathan. The motion Duke makes towards them is aggressive and completely unnecessary. Audrey takes a minute to realize she should be doing something about that, instead of sitting next to Nathan blankly holding his now doubly numb hand. 

"Just back off a sec, guys, I--"

"I don't have her number!" Duke sounds like he's about two seconds from spiking his phone into the ground.

"Dwight! Call Dwight!"

"Yes! Right! Obviously!"

After that there's a lot of running around and shouting through the phone, the end result of which is four people clustered over Nathan's still body as the sun dips below the horizon. 

"You're sure it works on people you've done it to before," Audrey says for possibly the fifth time in a row. 

"Yes, I'm sure. It worked on my sister the second time, you saw it." Noelle is humoring her, but in a gentle way. She really is too nice for her own good.

"And you're sure--"

"Audrey." She stops, the tone in Duke's voice pulling her entire focus urgently back to Nathan. The light fades, the stark lines of his narrow face turning to shadow. 

Noelle cries out, pressing a hand to her chest. Dwight gets a hand under her elbow and holds her up. A stab wound blooms beneath her fingers, then fades. 

Nathan stirs, groans. Audrey definitely starts crying and definitely doesn't care. 

"Ow," Nathan says, and opens his eyes. He looks around at all of them, fuzzily, blinks at Audrey with a quizzical smile. "Hi?"

"Hi." She's helpless to not smile back at him.

"You're crying." He still seems a little dazed, would never usually reach up with this fumbling gentleness to try to wipe her tears away. "So are you."

"Wow, way to call me out buddy." Duke has wiped his face of all evidence by the time Audrey turns to look, but his eyes are still that deep, deep brown that heralds a rare instance of him being completely serious. "Thank you," he tells Noelle, voice heavy with how much he means those words. 

"Did I die again?"

All four of them glare at Nathan. 

"You say that like it's becoming a habit," Dwight accuses him. 

"This is not going to become a habit," Duke agrees. 

"Aw, come on, it was at least a little satisfying stabbing me, wasn't it?" Nathan grunts his way into sitting up. 

Duke grimaces. "Hah, yeah, give me me a couple minutes to remember why I hate you, okay? You were dead. For real dead. I almost punched an EMT."

"That's assault. Parker, book him."

"Oh, now I remember."

Audrey rolls her eyes.  "It's 'cuz he thinks he's funny."

"Yep."

Duke's hand is doing some weird dance, towards Nathan's arm and then away again. He wants to feel for himself that he's okay, Audrey realizes, but touch between the two of them is always so  _ charged _ . She rolls her eyes again, picks Duke's hand up, and drops it on Nathan's. See, not a big deal. 

Nathan freezes. He looks down at Duke's hand, then up at Audrey, then down at his hand again. Then, very slowly, he brings his own fingers up to his face and touches his cheek. His eyes are huge, wondering, disbelieving. 

"Nathan?"

"I can feel. Not just you. I feel him. The grass. Chilly. I feel  _ everything _ ."


	2. Chapter 2

There's a moment when they all just stare at Nathan, and then everyone starts talking at once.

"What?" 

"How?"

"My healing doesn't cure Troubles!"

"The Crocker Curse." Dwight's eyes are wide when he looks at Duke. Audrey looks at him too, and then can't decide where to rest her eyes. On Nathan, running his fingers through the grass? Or on Duke, watching him? They both look like they've just found the belief in miracles. 

"Wait wait wait." Duke hand flutters in the air, his own personal sign language for 'stop, hold on, the Troubles are fucking with me again.' She's very familiar with this particular combination of finger twitches. "Are you saying what I think you are? If I kill a Trouble, it can't come back? Even if he does?"

"He's saying we've done it. We've cured a Trouble." Audrey didn't believe it until she says it out loud, but it's like the words break some kind of spell. Duke leaps to his feet, absurdly, exuberantly graceful. 

"Yes! Fucking yes! Take that, fate! Suck it!" He ruffles Nathan's hair, cackles when Nathan yelps in shock at the sensation. "I'm gonna save this whole stupid town!"

"The whole town?" Dwight and Noelle look like they're still catching up to what this means. 

"You can. Noelle, with you and Duke together, you  _ can _ . You can end the Troubles." There's a tremendous laugh bubbling in Audrey's diaphragm, an excitement too big for her ribs.

"I have to tell the Guard." Dwight stumbles to his feet. Audrey admires his loyalty, that that's his first thought. That he didn't say 'me next'.

"Wait." She knows Nathan would usually be the one to say this, but he's now rubbing his face on his sleeve, delighted. She's gonna leave him to that, he deserves it after all this time. She holds out a hand in front of Dwight's chest, makes sure he's looking in her eyes. "You're right, but we have to do this carefully. Hope makes people volatile."

"And I can only do one a day." Audrey is impressed with Noelle too. It takes it out of her, using this Trouble. It's not easy, and they're talking about a huge endeavor here, and yet there's no hesitation. She's a paramedic. Of course she doesn't shrink from an opportunity to help people. 

"Right. Dwight, does the Guard know about every Troubled person in Haven?"

"Nowhere near. Maybe two thirds, and that's counting the family names with vague stories about them and no other evidence."

"But you must have a triage list of some kind. The biggest possible threats?"

Dwight's eyebrows come down, bushy and imposing. "We're not cops. We don't think of our people as threats. Our triage is based on who's in danger, not who has the most potential to cause it."

"Okay." She's offended him. It's hard, talking about this. 

"Put the word out for volunteers." Nathan's brain is back online, apparently. He's still touching his mouth, absently, as if he doesn't realize he's doing it. He did that with the rose last time, too. Doesn't have any idea what it looks like, what it makes her think about. Christ, this is not the time, but she can't help letting her eyes fix on the motion of his fingers against his lips. "Be selective. People who can keep a secret. Tell them it's experimental, it's dangerous, and it might not work. Once we're sure, once it's been a month, two months, then we go for the desperate ones, as fast as we can."

He's right. They have to make sure there are no side effects, that this really is the cure it looks to be. And for that they need more data points. Also a scientist of some kind. Claire did experimental trials in school, right? 

Only one problem, though.

"I have nineteen days left," she reminds Nathan, and watches their faces all freeze.

"Right. Guess we know what it takes for us to forget that." Duke's mouth flattens; he's thinking. "Jordan said you go in the Barn and the Troubles stop. If the Troubles are gone, or if we're stopping them ourselves, maybe you don't have to go."

"That seems too convenient," says Dwight. Audrey nods.

"If I have to go, let's cure as many people as possible before I do," she says, and Nathan and Duke make hilariously similar faces of stubborn denial.    


"You can't just accept--"

"Audrey--"

"It doesn't matter. I mean, it matters," she backtracks when Duke squawks in outrage, "but it doesn't matter for what we do next. Whether or not the Hunter and the Barn come and I go, our priority right now is to cure as many people as possible in the time we have left. We need Moira. Two a day ups our limit to thirty-eight before the Hunter."

"I'm on it," Dwight says. "And I'll start rounding up volunteers to go first."

"If these guys you get can't keep a secret, we're screwed." Duke and Dwight do their weird half-distrust half-respect (half-sexual-tension, or at least Audrey likes to think so privately) eye contact. "Troubled folks storming the building taking us hostage accidentally killing us all and ruining everything level of screwed. You know it."

"Yeah. They'll keep the secret."

~~~

Possibly the only person surprised that Jordan McKee is the first volunteer is Duke. 

"Always knew you'd kill me some day, Crocker." She's afraid, Audrey can see it in the wideness of her eyes. Fear never seems to hold her back, though, just propel her even faster forward. 

"Yeah well trust me, it'll be a pleasure--"  Audrey puts a hand on Duke's back, right between his shoulders, and he stops. 

"It won't hurt." Claire says. This is part of the script she developed. She wanted to have people sign a release, but everyone agreed that was kind of ridiculous. "But if it doesn't work, you will die. Or still be Troubled, depending on which half fails."

"You've seen it work, though. Dwight said you've already cured someone."

"They have." 

Nathan raises his chin when Jordan looks at him. They have an awkwardly intense we-broke-up-two-days-ago-and-it-wasn't-amicable stare, and then she reaches for his hands. He jerks away. Her eyes narrow. 

"You. You're--"

"Yes."

There's a still moment of silence, and then Jordan lets out an utterly mirthless laugh.

"Of course. Of course it's you. Of course you got this." 

"The goal is for everyone to have it. If it works." Audrey can't see anything good coming from Nathan and Jordan being in the same room much longer. She makes a shooing motion with her hands. "Let's get started."

Claire and Nathan troop out, to join Dwight, Noelle, and Moira on the other side of the glass. They chose the morgue for this, not only because a dead body won't be out of place but because it's isolated from the rest of the hospital. Just in case.

"Duke and I will be the only ones in here with you, for safety reasons." Jordan's Trouble isn't one that's likely to go haywire at the moment of her death, but they're developing a protocol here. "If you like, I can hold your hand. I'm immune, it can't hurt me."

Jordan gives her a look of immense scorn. Yeah, Audrey didn't think she would go for that. 

"You'll be dead for about two hours, total. No one has reported any side effects of that, though there's some disorientation upon waking back up."

"And when I wake up I'll be cured."

"That's the idea." Duke rubs his hands together, like they're cold. Audrey would be hard pressed to say who looks more terrified and more determined not to show it, him or Jordan. 

"Well then, let's get on with it."

"Great." Duke's hands are shaking as he pulls on a pair of rubber gloves. Noelle already prepped the syringe for him, but he taps it carefully anyways. As if an air bubble would be more lethal than the morphine itself, somehow. He moves over to behind the table, gestures for Jordan to sit. She does. 

"I just...want you to know..."

"If it doesn't work you're sorry, I get it Crocker."

"No." Jordan can't see the look on his face, but Audrey can. She feels her heart squeeze as his mouth twists in fear and doubt and then firms again. "I want you to know I think this is gonna work. I believe it will. I wouldn't do it otherwise."

"That's nice. Do it."

Duke takes a deep breath. Audrey watches it happen in the creases around his eyes, as he moves from hesitation to decision. Once he's made up his mind, the motion is swift; one hand tilts Jordan's head to the side and the other empties the syringe into her vein. 

There's no pain, they made sure of that. Her eyes droop; he catches her as her body goes limp. They arrange her on the table together, and Audrey checks her pulse, feels it fade weaker and weaker until it disappears. Duke's eyes flash, then fade. He flinches away when she reaches for his hand. 

"Hey! You promised not to beat yourself up about this," Audrey reminds him. 

"Yeah well I'm a bad man and bad men break promises."

"Duke--"

"It's not a big deal, right, she's coming right back and everything, no problem. Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be a practiced killer soon enough: a couple more times and I won't feel a thing."

He won't meet her eyes. She wishes Duke would tell her what he's thinking  _ before _ moments like this happen. He just balls it all up inside and smiles over it, and he thinks he's avoiding bothering her with his feelings but all he's really doing is making moments like this inevitable. Making it so the only times he lets himself get mad at her are when he also hates himself. 

"I don't want to cure the Troubles if it ends up destroying you," she hisses, too honestly, but at least that gets him to look at her for real and get that sick smile off his face. 

"You don't mean that."

"I shouldn't, but I do."

They stare at each other, each looking for something in the other's face. And then Nathan knocks on the glass. 

"He wants to know if we're ready for Noelle."

"Sure."

"Let's get some air. In the parking lot?"

"You go ahead." Duke settles into a chair, folds his long body up until he's hunched over Jordan's still form. "I'm staying here."

"Duke come on--"

"Just let me do this, Audrey. Let me do this until she wakes up, and then I'll be okay."

So she goes outside to stare at the sky alone in angry helplessness. After a few minutes Nathan joins her. He turns his face into the breeze, briefly blissful, and she can't help but smile a little at that. If nothing else about this plan goes right, at least Nathan gets to have this. 

"You guys have a fight?" he asks, carefully neutral, eyes on the cloudless sky instead of on her.

"Maybe. Kind of." She blows out a long breath, makes a sharp frustrated gesture at the uncaring parking lot. "He thinks it doesn't matter if it hurts him, doing this. Saving everyone."

"Does it? Versus people's lives?"

"Yes!" She doesn't want to be mad at Nathan too, but she's going to be if he can't understand this. "It matters. Maybe it doesn't mean we should stop, because you're right this is people's lives, but it  _ matters _ ."

"You think he might get hooked? Go rogue?"

"For fuck's sake Nathan!"

"It's a possibility--"

"Yeah and you know what else is? Him  _ hating _ himself! Thinking he's a killer! Which, whatever you say, we both know he's not." 

Nathan looks mulish, which means he knows she's right.

"Everything he's done has been self-defense, or defending innocent lives. We've both killed in the line of duty too, much more than he has," she presses, and he huffs out a breath of air that appears to be surrender.

"No, he's not a killer."

" _ Thank _ you, was that so hard?"

He resettles his shoulders irritably. From Nathan that's as good as a verbal admission that, yes, actually, it was. 

"So, what do we do about it?" he asks. That's one of the really nice things about Nathan; when she wins the argument, he sulks for a minute, sure, but then he gets over himself and tries to help. 

She sighs. "I don't know." 

When they get back inside the morgue Noelle has already come and gone. They all agreed to keep the sisters' role in this a secret, to let everyone cured think it was some previously-undiscovered application of the Crocker Curse that was doing this on its own. Not just because Noelle and Moira are safer that way, have a much greater chance of living to see the end of this, but also because they couldn't imagine anything good coming from half of Haven knowing that resurrection was possible. The Troubles aren't the only things that kill people, after all, and the Troubled aren't the only ones whom death and danger make desperate. 

"Sunset's in about ten minutes."

"Thanks." 

Duke meets her eyes and gives a little apologetic grimace. That's so not where Audrey wants to leave things, but she also doesn't know what she wants to say, so she just nods. 

She and Nathan take seats next to Jordan's body. After a minute or so Dwight comes inside too and takes up position in the corner, arms crossed. 

Sunset was scheduled for 7:45pm today. Audrey set an alarm on her phone, but they don't need it; Jordan gasps in air, a long heaving draw, and her eyes open. (Elsewhere in the hospital Claire has, according to their procedure, found Noelle a private room to lie down in while she heals the effects of a morphine overdose.)

"Did it work?" is the first thing out of Jordan's mouth. She sits up immediately, eyes sharp: no disorientation there, though Audrey suspects that she's not a typical case. 

"You tell me," Duke says softly, and holds out his hand. 

They stare at each other for a moment, her eyes wide and disbelieving, his almost unbearably kind. Jordan's fingers flinch back three times in a row before she can get herself to make contact with his skin.

There's a breathless pause from all of them, listening to the absence of screams of pain. 

Jordan throws herself off the table, the most uncoordinated and uncontrolled movement Audrey's ever seen her make. Her arms are trembling when she flings them around Duke. He catches her with a startled huff of breath, hands only coming up her back halfway as if he's not quite sure how this 'hugging' thing is supposed to work.

"Thank you.  _ Thank you _ ," she hisses. "No, don't say anything, you horrible pirate, just...thank you."

This is it, Audrey thinks as she beams and breathes and tactfully pretends that neither Jordan nor Duke is crying. This is the moment. This is what they'll look back on, years from now in a peaceful, boring small town, and say, "and that's when we knew it was finally going to be over."

Nathan doesn't see it yet, that this is it. He's looking at Jordan and a thousand worries are marshaling in his gaze, probably about who she might tell and what they might do. Audrey doesn't fault him that, in fact she'll be right there with him soon enough. But she's going to have to lead him out of these frantic Troubled woods step-by-step, she realizes. Same way she led him in. That's okay. They will have time, she knows that now. She believes it, eighteen days and the Hunter be damned.

Over Jordan's shoulder, she meets Duke's eyes. He was watching her watch Nathan, it's obvious, but he looks away the minute their eyes catch. He's been doing that ever since they kissed in Colorado. How long are they going to play this game? she wonders a little helplessly. More importantly, how is she going to stop it from ripping him apart?

They swear Jordan to secrecy again before they let her leave. Dwight watches her go with a wary gaze that says it still might not be enough.

"She's taken her own initiative on things before now," he says when Audrey asks. "She has her own agendas."

"Everyone does." She doesn't mean to be contrary, but she feels that has to be said. Dwight shrugs. 

"Maybe, but Jordan plays hers real close to the chest."

"How'd you feel about tailing her for a couple of days?" Nathan says, and Dwight grins. 

"Thought you'd never ask."

The three of them end up at the Gull after that, helping Duke close up in mutual contemplative silence. Nathan keeps making eyes at Audrey like he wants to make their excuses and go upstairs, and she's definitely tempted: she knows what's trembling between them, knows that the minute they're alone with a moment to breathe and, for Nathan, a moment to really  _ feel _ , they're going to be all over each other. But she still doesn't feel right about how she left things with Duke. 

"Drink?" she suggests, brandishing a bottle of his own stock at Duke, and he rolls his eyes and gets the glasses. 

"I'm adding this to your rent," he says as he pours.

"I'm taking it out of your parking tickets," she counters. 

"No you're not." Nathan sits himself on a stool and gives her a quelling look. 

"You're not the boss of me."

"Actually, he is your boss. Like, professionally." 

"Yeah, we try  _ not _ to bring that up?" Audrey makes a face at Duke. He makes one back at her. It feels good, bullshitting back and forth like this, a nice warm fizz in her chest.

She doesn't want to lose this. Not because of Nathan, and not because of the Troubles. 

"Duke," she starts, and he groans and raises a frankly rude 'hang on' finger in her face. He tips his glass back, drains it, and pours another. 

"Okay. Can't stop you, so, have at, what are we talking about." She knows he's being an ass about this as a diversionary tactic, but it's backfiring because honestly the implication that she's some kind of force of nature that he can't avoid and won't even try to stop is very flattering.

"That first time. When Kyle killed himself with your knife."

"Oh, is that how it happened?" Duke huffs out a not-laugh. Audrey frowns.

"Yes. I was there, remember? That's exactly what happened, and the fact that you don't remember it that way? That worries me."

"Really. Because if you asked Nathan, he'd tell a different story." 

"Not any more." Audrey is so startled by hearing that from Nathan that she almost falls off her stool. Duke freezes, glass halfway to his mouth, and lowers it back down to the table very slowly. Nathan is making studious eye contact with the drinks shelf. His fingers are rubbing against the rough wood of the bar, learning its texture. "I'm done with that. With...all of it. Whatever happened before, whatever--it's done."

"What the hell brought this on." Audrey shares that question, though she wishes Duke could find a way not to sound angry about it, not when Nathan finally seems like he's agreeing to bend.

Nathan shrugs. "Not really about you. Starting to realize my instincts aren't actually too good when it comes to some folks."

Oh, god. Audrey can't help it, she reaches out and covers his hand on the bar. He twitches, all the way up his arm, and she takes her hand back because she can't tell if that was a good reaction or not. She sees, now, what he means. How being so very wrong about Jordan is the thing that finally clued him in that he might be wrong about Duke, too. 

She remembers that moment up on the cliff last month, when they both watched Duke save Daphne seconds after Nathan had been completely sure he was going to kill her. She hadn't thought to hope that would be a wakeup call for him, had assumed after all her efforts that his distrust was too entrenched to be reached by any new evidence. She's pretty happy to be proven incorrect on that count. She loves him a lot, this man who abandons a years-long grudge completely the moment he understands he was in the wrong.

"Just like that." Duke is watching Nathan warily. Nathan is watching the bar.

"Pretty much. You...took care of Parker, in Colorado." 

Audrey can't help but echo Duke's sly smile at that. She knows that it's not cool to be taking this much delight in a sexy secret with one guy when she's considering a serious relationship with another. She also knows that it's not actually a necessary secret; Nathan was with Jordan, so what does she have to hide? The twin feelings of satisfaction and guilt persist nevertheless.

"I don't need taking care of." She feels the protest is somewhat obligatory at this point. 

"You kinda do, you tried to live off vending machines for three days," says Duke. Nathan snorts.

"How dare you, that was a  _ secret _ ." She said that on purpose, fully intending to elicit that same private smile one more time. Instead his mouth gets halfway into a curve before it turns back down. 

"The Hunter might still come for you, you know." Duke Crocker, buzzkill extraordinaire. People would say Nathan is the pessimist, but nope, Duke is actually the one with the litany of worries running behind his eyes, who looks at a situation and can point out the problem with it in three seconds flat. 

"Doesn't matter, it's still not getting her." Nathan is, grumpy face to the contrary, an optimist. A very angry optimist, but he sets his sights on an outcome and basically tries to will it into existence with the force of his belief. 

Audrey likes to think of herself as a realist. If nothing else it puts her right in between Duke and Nathan, and that's exactly where she wants to be. 

...huh. She's never actually...phrased that to herself quite like that before. That's...hm. That's a thing to consider, right there.

"Parker?" Nathan nudges her with his elbow, gently. "You okay?"

"Yeah, just...thinking." She's going to have to come back to that particular revelation, at  _ length _ . For now, though, she shakes her head and re-focuses. "It may still come--in fact, I think it probably will, I can't imagine us curing some of the Troubles is enough to stop this....cycle, not if it's been going on for over a century. But I think it makes a difference, that we know how to stop them for good now. Now we at least have something to bring to the table."

"Because the magic Barn is going to  _ negotiate _ on taking you into outer space." Duke has apparently decided the Barn is a spaceship. Hell, it could be, for all they know. 

"I'm very persuasive," she says, grinning, and that gets him to laugh. 

She and Nathan don't go upstairs together after all; instead the three of them finish their drinks and then drift their separate ways. Walking Nathan to his car, though, Audrey does offer her hand, palm up and open, and he takes it. He's cold. He's needs to start wearing more layers now that he can feel the temperature. 

"We didn't have very good luck last time we made a date," she starts. He raises his eyebrows and she can see him thinking what a colossal understatement that was. "So how's this? Tomorrow evening, if we're not in an alternate timeline or fighting evil plant monsters or hunting a murderer or the thousand other things that probably will happen, and if we get out of work at a reasonable time with a reasonable amount of life left in our bodies, we'll grab dinner."

"Seems reasonable." His mouth twitches at the corner the way it does when he knows he shouldn't find her corniness funny but does anyways. She loves that look. She loves that it makes it so obvious what a squishy  _ dork _ he is inside. She has to drag his face down and kiss him, then, feel the way he shivers against her and so, so carefully holds her chin.

"No pressure," she whispers into his mouth, because eighteen days and Jordan and his still-very-recent Trouble and a thousand other things. "Not on dinner, not on anything. We'll just...we'll see."

"We'll see," he agrees, like he hasn't already made up his mind and they both don't already know that, and bends down to kiss her one more time.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is kind of a rough one, so I want to reiterate the content warning just in case: this chapter contains discussion of the aftermath of sexual consent violation. Please take care of yourself! Happy to answer more detailed questions about the contents, or to add more detailed warning tags, just leave a comment.

In the next five days they cure eight people of their Troubles. Six of them are Guard protectees, people whose Troubles are so bad that they've been isolated in safehouses since they began. Audrey doesn't ask, and Dwight doesn't say, how many of them went willingly to their confinement. But she does hold their hands--once despite all of the oxygen being swiftly sucked out of the room, poor Brianne--as they go down, and watch as they come up and their faces lighten with freedom they never thought they'd experience.

Audrey also has sex with Nathan Wournos. It's a less important development than curing people, she is very firmly aware of that fact, but it's...personally salient. She sees someone in a different light, a different context, in bed; often she thinks it's like seeing a whole other person they keep inside of themselves. Nathan's inside person is endlessly sweet, full of brushing gentle kisses and the light slide of just the very tips of his fingers along her skin. After the first time, when he was serious and reverent, so determined to Get It Right, he's goofy: he tells stupid jokes and he bites the fat over her hipbones lightly to make her squirm and laugh. When she does something he really likes he squeezes his eyes tightly shut and all the muscles in his shoulders and neck go soft and loose.

Based on her fake memories, Audrey is aware that usually when people get into a new relationship they spend less time with their other friends. (Original Audrey Parker absolutely _hated_ that phenomenon, in fact she broke a couple friendships over it in college which to Audrey now seems like an overreaction but certainly felt justified at the time.) She notes, and adds to her collection of other facts she is slowly and deliberately considering, that that has not been the case here. In fact, she and Nathan have gone from seeing Duke a couple times a week to seeing him for the majority of every day. Of course part of it is that they're spending five hours a day going through the curing process, but every evening seems to find them at the closed Gull after last call, too.

Duke obviously knows that when he leaves for the night Nathan goes upstairs with Audrey, but they don't talk about that. (Yet. Audrey is biding her still-very-limited time, she's figuring stuff out.) They make plans for when the Barn comes, vague and probably useless; they lay out the next day of careful sounding out of citizens to find the most-Troubled people, the ones most in need of a cure; one night Duke manages to goad Nathan into telling growing-up-in-Haven stories, which includes the precious, priceless knowledge that sixteen-year-old Duke Crocker decided a nipple ring was a sound investment.

"Oh my god," Audrey says, awed by this revelation.

"Hey, hey, that's not fair, I was going through a phase."

"What kind of phase, exactly?" Nathan inquires innocently, and Duke glares at him and retaliates:

"Nathan had a mullet."

"You _didn't_." Audrey turns to him, mouth dropping open in delight.

"Not on purpose," he says, sulkily, which is even better.

"You had an _accidental mullet_."

"Bangs, too, the next year. Down to here. He used to hide behind them when girls tried to talk to him," Duke adds. His tone has slid from mocking to fond. Nathan wouldn't have made that distinction two weeks ago, but there's been a shift in him; that moment when he decided that his grudge was over was apparently an even bigger change than Audrey realized.

"Girls were scary," he says, comfortably, then raises an eyebrow at Duke. "Also _someone_ \--" Duke winces.

"Yeah. Still sorry."

"I know." Nathan taps Duke's beer bottle with his own in a typically taciturn assurance.

"Anyways, apparently girls weren't _that_ scary, Katie Swinton brought up your 'study date' at every party Junior year. The minute she got buzzed all she would talk about was Nathan Wournos' 'awesome hands'." Duke raises his eyebrows, grinning. Nathan's ears turn pink.

"Oooh, saucy," Audrey comments, helpfully. Duke and Nathan both roll their eyes at her.

"You know, I can't _wait_ until you know your real history. This one-way mockery is going to be avenged," Duke declares, pointing his bottle at her. She blinks.

"Wait. You think the Barn has my real memories?"

"Well, sure." Duke lowers his beer, surprised, at their stares. "It made you Audrey Parker, right? And Lucy, and Sarah. Doesn't it just make sense that it's got whoever you were first, too?"

"I guess that does make sense." The thought just never occurred to Audrey before. Suddenly an entire new dimension has been added to the coming of the Barn, and there's a new twist in her tangle of feelings about it, anticipatory and a little scared.

"Parker." Nathan's long fingers cover hers and press down, once. "Whatever you find, you're still you."

"Am I, though?" Audrey isn't one for these vague ontological questions: what is a soul, do we live on after death, all that bullshit. Now, though, those questions have gone from theoretical to very directly applicable to her life, and she finds herself having to contend with them whether she wants to or not.

Nathan doesn't answer, and neither does Duke. They finish their drinks in silence, and then she and Nathan go upstairs, Duke's eyes on their backs as he gets into to his car.

~~~

At four a.m. the next morning, Audrey wakes up because Nathan is breathing hard next to her. At first she thinks he's having a nightmare--wouldn't be the first time for either of them--but then he sighs out a "yes please…" and his shoulders do a very familiar loosen-and-settle and she realizes he's having a sex dream instead. She grins and settles down beside him to watch and wait him out.

"Have fun?" she asks when his eyes finally blink open, his cheeks flushed and his chest still rising and falling rapidly.

"Huh?" he says. His face cycles through disorientation, satisfaction, a sudden flash of guilt, and then settles on wary. "Uhm."

"Oh, what, like I should have a right to be jealous of what you dream? That would be crazy." She knocks her head into his shoulder gently in reassurance and feels him relax. "Yeah. Back to sleep? Or do you wanna tell me about it?"

"Uh," he says again, looking a little panicked which is not at all what she wants.

"Back to sleep," she decides for him, and flops her head back to the pillow.

"If you want--" he starts, clearly not enthused about the idea, and she rolls her eyes.

"Sleeping now, Nathan. Shhh. Some of us have important jobs we need to be at in the morning."

"Oh, sure."

It's not like she actually needs him to tell her who the dream was about. Nathan, bless his awkward heart, makes it abundantly clear the next day by walking directly into a wall trying not to meet Duke's eyes.

Duke, distracted by something Claire is saying to him about the curing procedures, doesn't notice. Audrey does, though, and gives Nathan a (possibly overly smug) 'gotcha' look. His eyes go huge and he almost walks back into the same wall, but manages to turn it into a stumble out the door and around the corner instead.

"Hey, where did Nate go?" Duke says.

"Dispatch call," says Audrey, happily, and sits herself down to think nice and in-depth about what this new development could mean.

She knew Nathan was, occasionally, into men. Not because he told her outright--they tell each other very few things outright that they haven't already said some other way, with eyes or hands or hidden-yet-understood meanings. In this case Nathan tripped over his words in a very familiar way at a community meeting when a striking man with bright blue eyes asked a question, and again after the meeting when shaking the same man's hand in the general "thank you for coming" mill. Audrey caught his eye with a raised brow; he shrugged, with a self-conscious grimace that only partially masked the real wariness in his eyes; she gave him an exaggerated thumbs-up; and he rolled his eyes and moved on to supervise cleanup. So, though they haven't actually had the 'so you're not straight?' 'not quite, are we gonna have a problem?' 'nope by the way me neither' conversation out loud, they've had a reasonable equivalent and this isn't much of a surprise on that front.

What _is_ surprising is that Nathan is so shaken by it. Is it because it was Duke? But this can't possibly be the first time he's had a fantasy about him, can it? Is it because he's in a relationship now, and feels like it's cheating somehow? She wouldn't put that level of over-the-top devotion past him, but she thought she'd made it clear there was no need for guilt about a dream of all things. Could it be that something about _this_ dream, specifically, got to him enough to make him clumsy with it? Was it kinky? (She hopes it was kinky). Or was it a feelings dream? Those can be more powerful than just the sexy kind, as she well knows, and with Nathan feelings always seem to be the thing that trips him up the hardest.

Nathan slinks back into the morgue about half an hour later, blank Cop Face on.

"Oh good, you're here, Irene is due any minute," Audrey says, with enough casual briskness that he knows she's dropping the subject. His shoulders relax a little, and she knows he gets it; he doesn't have to talk about it unless he wants to. (Until then, she has plenty of theories to play with on her own.)

They cure four more people. Audrey has ten days left before the Barn comes. And then the next person who comes to them is Beadie.

"If you have other people who need it more, I can wait," she says in her normal blunt manner. That's the first time they've heard that, which is promising, because it means they may have reached the end of the desperate ones. "But the babies? It's been almost a year and they haven't aged, not at all. I don't know how much longer I can care for two newborn infants."

Haven is _so weird_. Every time Audrey thinks she's seen the full extent of it, it proves her wrong.

"Give me an hour or two to check, but I think you can be next," Audrey assures her. Beadie is tough; the relief of hearing that must be overwhelming, but the only sign of it is a slight softening of the wrinkles around her eyes. She and Nathan are of a piece: taciturn, solid Mainers with wind-roughened skin and kind hearts. Audrey likes Beadie a lot, and she's glad when her check-ins with Dwight and Nathan reveal no one else who needs priority and she can call Beadie back and tell her to come to the morgue at 6pm tonight for her cure.

Duke and Beadie have a weird relationship. As far as Audrey knows, Duke remembers almost nothing of the Helena incident; he's been told the summary, of course, but he frowned the whole way through like it was a book he'd read years ago and wasn't sure they were recounting accurately. The fact remains, though, that some really messed up, not-at-all-consensual-for-either-party stuff went down between them, and it shows in how he doesn't touch her more than the bare minimum as he prepares the morphine and injects it.

"Well, that was fun," Duke says briskly once she's out and Noelle has been by to touch her hand. "Death, murder, destruction, welcome to Tuesday. Anyone seen any good movies lately?"

"The last movie I saw was two minutes of some old documentary while trying to convince Hadley Chambers to stop turning Haven into a snow globe," says Audrey. Nathan huffs his little 'you're ridiculous and I don't think you're funny I swear' laugh behind her. Duke pulls a hugely scandalized expression, hand on his chest. If he had pearls, he'd be clutching them.

"Nathan you are not treating your lady right. Take her to a goddamn movie."

"Oh, what, you're the authority on classy dates here? Should I take her smuggling, too? Fishing?"

"That's a libelous insinuation, I am a law-abiding citizen." Audrey snorts at that, which makes Duke smirk, pleased with himself. "Also fishing is romantic, Nathan, christ. Beautiful sea everywhere you look, completely alone together...you get to show off your cooking skills and then retire to the cabin directly…"

"Used that one a lot, have you," Audrey surmises. Personally, she would rather do pretty much anything than sit in awkward silence for hours trapped in the middle of the ocean staring at a bobbing lure, but she can see the appeal for someone with a longer attention span. Duke gives a smug shrug.

"A gentleman doesn't kiss and tell."

That's Nathan's cue to make a 'gentleman' crack, obviously. When he doesn't, Audrey glances at him and finds the strangest look on his face. She can't quite decipher it, but the closest comparison she could make is when he's interrogating a file, trying to find the last little piece to break a case open, and he thinks he's found it. He gets this same narrow focus in his eyes, the same tiny head tilt of realization.

" _What_?" Duke says, glaring back at him.

"Nothing. Fishing. Romantic. Sure," Nathan mumbles. Duke opens his mouth to say something sarcastic about what a terrible deflection that was, and then Beadie does them all a favor and wakes up, effectively forestalling what was sure to be a colossally stupid argument.

She's a little shaky as she tries to sit up, and Audrey hurries to get a hand under her arm. It takes some folks harder than others, they've learned, but almost everyone benefits from a glass of water and some calm, quiet conversation post-resurrection.

"How do you feel?" Audrey inquires, gently, and in lieu of answering Beadie fumbles her phone out of her pocket, hits the first speed dial, and presses it, hand trembling, to her ear.

"How are they? Are they all right?" she demands the moment the other side picks up. Audrey can't hear the voice on the other side, but Beadie's face, the broad, delighted smile that spreads across it, tells it all.

"They can crawl," she tells the assembled room. Nathan's face collapses into a goopy mess. Audrey, because she's a horrible awkward weirdo, pats Beadie on the shoulder encouragingly.

"Hey, that's really great," Duke says, voice warm and demonstrating once again that he's the only one in their trio with any actual social skills. He still doesn't touch Beadie; in fact he pivots out of her way as Audrey carefully helps her to her feet and she gathers her things.

"Thank you," she tells him, and he inclines his head the way he has every time a formerly-Troubled person says it. Audrey thinks that one graceful gesture shows a lot about the words he isn't saying in response.

"Jean. Your daughter," Beadie continues, and Duke freezes. "It's safe, now. You can see her."

Audrey watches as Duke's face bleeds from shock to a kind of frozen alarm, wildness creeping into his eyes. He opens his mouth, but can't seem to think of anything to say.

"Hey, Claire?" Audrey calls, a little too urgently, and Claire arrives at the door at a trot, brow already furrowing at whatever is in her voice. "Beadie go ahead with Claire, she'll--" What is Claire even going to _do_ other than get Beadie out of the room so that Duke no longer has to stare at her with that gutted gape? It doesn't matter. She leaves, and Audrey shuts the door firmly behind her.

"I," Duke says, as if it's a full sentence instead of an awkward stutter of a sound. The wild terror--confusion?--is spreading down into his hands, they're lifting and twitching. Audrey reaches out for his arm and he jerks away, which hurts, she'll admit, but she also isn't going to touch him if he doesn't want her to. She backs off, and then she and Nathan just sort of watch helplessly as he starts to pace, quick strides like a caged animal.

"I gave her up," is what he says at last, and that hits Audrey a lot harder than she wants it to. "I gave up on her." Ow ow ow. "It's done, it was over."

Audrey really wants to be able to say something, but she's reeling instead, imagining a little girl with Duke's eyes hearing him say 'I gave up on her.'

"Hard for anything to be over for good in Haven," Nathan says, neutrally. Duke huffs a completely humorless laugh.

" _Tell_ me about it."

"This is a good thing," Nathan states, like he's trying to make it so by saying it, and Duke _snarls_ at him. For once, Audrey thinks, maybe this brewing fight should just...happen. Maybe it will help.

" _Fuck_ you, Nathan."

"Real mature, there--"

"You do _not_ get to pull that on me, I _did_ the mature thing. And that was the end of it!"

"Don't be _stupid_ ," Audrey really wishes these guys could have a discussion without insults. Like, just once. "You really thought having a _kid_ could be over that easily? She'd wonder, eventually. You were never going to disappear completely from her life; she's going to ask, when she gets old enough. If they ever tell her." He jerks his chin up, daring Duke to say that hiding the adoption would be better when he knows what it did to Nathan to find out how he did.

"I _didn't think_ , okay?" They're doing that thing where they snarl into each other's faces from about an inch apart now. At least Duke will let him get that close, Audrey supposes. "Because I _didn't get a choice_! Nobody got any kind of choice about _any_ of this, _Nathan_."

"And you've got one now, so man up and--"

Okay, that's enough, too far. Audrey clamps a hand around Nathan's arm, suddenly and solidly enough that he stops talking abruptly. A lot more gently, she reaches for Duke. He looks at her hand for a minute--glares at it really, jaw clenched--and then nods jerkily. She wraps his fingers around his wrist and tows the both of them to sit down on one of the morgue tables.

"Duke. Do you _want_ to see her?" She can't, despite her very best efforts, keep the hurt out of her voice. It's too close to home, this subject.

Duke's shoulders slump, and she squeezes his wrist a little, trying to apologize with her fingers for the reproach she can't seem to excise from her tone.

"I don't know how to be--" He stops, shakes his head hard, the long lines of his face very set and his eyes very hard. "This isn't for me. The whole 'dad' thing. It's not...she's got a family."

"Speaking as someone who knows a bit about how she might feel? I'm sure her family is great, but it doesn't mean she doesn't want to know you, too," Audrey says, as gently as she knows how.

"Coming and going again...popping in just long enough to mess up her life and then leave...that's worse than not showing up at all." Duke's mouth firms, like that's a decision right there. "I'm not doing that."

"You wouldn't," Nathan cuts in while Audrey is still trying to figure out what to say to that. "You're not your dad, Duke. You never will be."

"You don't know anything about me, Nathan," Duke says, which is so false as to be ridiculous, and then he jerks his arm out of Audrey's hold and crashes out of the door.

The two of them, left behind, stare at that swinging door in silence for a long minute.

"Not my place to tell," Nathan says, reprovingly, before Audrey even opens her mouth. She scowls. He doesn't _know_ she was going to ask about Simon Crocker. She hates the hidden stories in this small town sometimes.

Audrey sends Nathan back to the Gull before her because she needs to see Claire first, and take shameless advantage of her psychotherapy training to vent. Audrey is self-aware enough to know that she shouldn't see Duke again before she gets some of her feelings out in a safer environment.

"I just keep thinking about this little girl waiting, and wondering," she tells Claire, who nods and then takes a _massive_ bite of the scone Audrey bribed her with to listen to her woes. For someone so delicate-looking, she manages to fit a really significant portion of the pastry into her mouth at once, it's pretty impressive. Audrey takes it as a signal to keep talking. "You should have seen her, Claire, I handed her over myself and she was _beautiful_. None of this is her fault."

"Very true," Claire agrees, but in that way where she's only agreeing with Audrey temporarily so she can challenge her on something else. Audrey both hates and admires that technique. "Whose fault is it?"

"No one, that's the hard part! You can't even really talk about it in terms of sexual assault, because who did the assaulting? Helena wasn't a real person, she was a creation of the Troubles. And it certainly wasn't under Beadie's control in any way."

"So not Duke's fault?"

"God no! Of course not!"

"But you blame him, a bit. For his response."

"No! Not for giving her up!" Audrey pauses, because she said that very loudly and, as Claire's raised eyebrow eloquently conveys, usually that's a sign she's covering for something. "Okay, maybe for giving her up, a bit. But that's not fair, is it."

"I don't know that your feelings have to be 'fair'."

"Something should be, in all of this." Claire concedes that point with a nod of her head.

"Okay. So why do you think you blame him, when you know it's not fair to?"

"Ugh, you already think you know why, just _say_ it." Audrey doesn't appreciate being guided to a conclusion, it's patronizing. Claire sighs.

"You resist things when I say them, you know. Fine. Do you think perhaps it's not about Duke and his daughter at all, but instead about your own parents?"

"What? No." Audrey wrinkles her nose. "I mean, yes I feel strongly about it because I relate. So does Nathan, being adopted--oh, shit, did you know that already? Okay, good." She forgets which secrets Claire is in on, it's a problem. "It's a charged topic. But I know the difference between my own history and someone else's situation."

"I'm not suggesting you don't. But our histories can sometimes make it very easy for us to put ourselves into one person's shoes, and harder to relate to others'. Sometimes we don't notice when those shoes are, in fact, different from the ones that hurt us in our own pasts."

"...meaning…?"

"Meaning Duke having a momentary hesitation about whether or not to contact his daughter isn't the same as your parents never contacting you."

"...oh." Crap, she has a point. Audrey hides behind taking a long sip from her coffee cup so she doesn't have to answer, which of course is its own answer. Claire looks smug. "You know, you don't have to look so proud of yourself."

"I really do. You take your satisfaction where you can get it, in this job."

Audrey buys Claire another scone, as thanks and also as acknowledgement of her victory because Claire practices psychotherapy like it's a competitive sport. Then she heads to the Gull, mentally trying to piece together some kind of apology as she drives. She was selfish, that's the core of it, she decides as she parks outside. She's sorry for being selfish and making this about her when it should be about him.

She opens the door to the bar and blinks. Nathan and Duke are at one of the back tables, and they appear to be arm wrestling.

"Uh," she says, coming up to their table. "What's all this?"

"Audrey!" Duke looks up, declaims her name like it's a sonnet, and promptly loses the contest. His arm thumps onto the table and he groans, shaking it out. "Three out of five!" he demands, and Nathan shrugs, hides one of his private smiles behind a drink of his beer, and nods.

"Sure, if that'll make you feel better."

"Fuck you, Audrey distracted me."

"What are you _doing_?" Audrey says again, and Duke flashes her a smile that is completely, 100% fake, but so shiny in its manic cheer.

"We are getting drunk and I am wiping the table with Nathan--"

"Right, sure--"

"--and we're not thinking about anything, definitely not any phone calls that might have been made earlier or any plane tickets we bought."

Audrey takes a minute to sort through all that, and then her eyes widen. Duke immediately turns back to the arm wrestling contest, so all she can really do is stare at the back of his head in disbelief.

"You--you called them? You're going to see Jean?"

"We're not thinking about that," Duke informs Nathan's elbow, huffing out a breath of exertion as Nathan applies more pressure. "But if we were, we'd say we got you a ticket too. January." Three months after the Hunter meteor storm.

Audrey, once again, can't think of anything to say. Her chest feels bruised inside with a massive, overwhelming tenderness, and with gratitude. It's like when a Troubled person trusts her enough to listen and let her help solve it, but more so, _infinitely_ more. It is faith in humans, and particularly in _this_ human, Duke Crocker who always, _always_ reaches inside of himself and gives for others no matter how hard it is.

She knows he doesn't want to talk about it, so she blinks back the water gathering in her eyes and doesn't say anything. This pressure inside of her can't be eased by that alone, though, and she can't help but reach out and touch his shoulder--his cheek, really, where it meets his neck. He freezes, very still, and she thinks she made a mistake until his eyes flutter closed and he leans into it, just slightly. She wants to kiss him, desperately; can feel the phantom touch of his mouth on hers, and is almost bending down when she remembers, just in time, that Nathan is literally right there watching. 

She stops, and meets his eyes over Duke's head. She knows she should somehow apologize for what's clearly written on her face, but she can't, she _won't_. He nods, with an expression she can't really read, and then knocks Duke's hand down onto the table.

"Not fair!" Duke's eyes spring open with outrage, and Audrey takes her hand back quickly, confused but pretty sure Nathan's small smile means he's not mad, at least. "Audrey distracted me again! This is a conspiracy!"

"Five out of seven?" Nathan offers, comfortably, and Audrey bites her lip, decides not to worry about it for now, and drags over a chair.

"My turn," she declares, and Nathan blinks and then narrows his eyes as he holds out his hand. She grins. He doesn't know she won Probationary Agent Arm-Wrestling Champ four years running at Quantico, but he's about to find out.

Audrey ends up driving Duke back to his boat at the end of the evening, while he sprawls in the back in a comfortably drunk flop and Nathan, also fairly buzzed, lets him drape his legs over his lap with uncharacteristic lack of protest. Nathan is coordinated enough to help pour Duke into his bed at least. Audrey is conscious of his eyes on her neck when she makes the choice to bend down and brush her lips over Duke's forehead, but again, she can't feel regret. Not when Duke smiles so beatifically and mumbles her name, already half asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter earns the story its explicit rating /o\

Audrey drives them back to the Gull, and by the time they get to their apartment Nathan has sobered up, his eyes clear and hands sure again. He runs himself a glass of water and changes into his pajamas while she wanders around fiddling with things and sneaking glances at him, and then he sits down on the bed and waits patiently while she pretends to be  _ very diligently _ brushing her teeth instead of stalling. 

Finally she sighs and sits down next to him. 

"Before you decide if you're angry with me or not, you need the full story," she says before he can begin, and he blinks and nods. Audrey reassures herself that, no matter how angry he gets about this, he's probably not going to end the relationship completely and she can work with that, and then takes a deep breath. 

"I kissed Duke in Colorado. And didn't tell you. I'm sorry."

"Parker it's okay," he says. 

There's a beat of silence. He's definitely not lying, given how transparent Nathan is when he's having Feelings, but she doesn't get why. He's not possessive--she wouldn't be with him if he was, the thought of someone claiming ownership over her right to decide who to talk to and interact with just because they're together is frankly repulsive to her--but there's more than just a jealousy issue, here. She kept something from him, intentionally. She knows that's not right.

She gives Nathan a baffled look. He reads something of the questions she's got, obviously, because his mouth twitches a little, almost ruefully. 

"I'm not mad because I did too."

She blinks. "Did...you kissed Duke?  _ When _ ?" 

"In that dream."

"In-- _ Nathan _ , you know a dream isn't the same thing, right?" 

"Close enough." Nathan's face is carefully blank, and she's getting fewer and fewer words per response out of him, both of which are sure signs that something is going on here. Possibly theirs would be a more serene partnership if she didn't push him in moments like this, but she is who she is and it works for them.

"You want to tell me about it," she half-guesses, and realizes she hit the nail right on the head when his eyes slide away from hers towards the wall. Ha. Score one for Detective Parker. "You can. You  _ should _ ; I want you to."

"Kinda weird, don't you think?"

"We live in Haven, we are  _ weird people _ . This is nothing. Come on, come here." She hauls him back by his bicep--he goes willingly, another sign she's on the right track--until he's lying back in bed. "Hang on, though, if this is going to get sexy I want to be ready."

"It's not--"

"Hey, I'm not saying it has to, I'm just saying I'm prepared." She changes quickly, into a large t-shirt and a pair of briefs. She really likes briefs to sleep in, and coincidentally, Nathan also has a bit of a Thing about them. When she turns back towards the bed his eyes are fixed on her thighs where they disappear into her shirt. She grins and lies down next to him. 

"Okay. I'm listening."

He's quiet for long enough that she starts to think he's probably going to change his mind. That's okay; Audrey will push, because it's who she is and it's what works for them, but she'll never push past a 'no'. If he doesn't want to any more, she'll let it go.

But, somewhat to her surprise, eventually Nathan makes a little huffing noise and offers, "He had a nightmare."

"In the dream?"

"Yeah." Nathan's nose wrinkles, as if dreams inside of dreams is anything close to the weirdest thing a subconscious can come up with.

"Okay. And you were there?" she prompts. 

"Same bed. Didn't register as strange." Of course not, that's how dreams work. Audrey knows he's awkward about this, but wow, she's beginning to think he's never had a dream before in his life. "I. Uh."

"As much or as little detail as you want," she encourages, trying to keep the thirst for  _ as much detail as possible _ out of her voice. He gives her an ironic look that says he knows exactly what she'd prefer.

"I'd rather show you," he says eventually. 

"Absolutely!" she agrees, way too enthusiastically for the calm, supportive atmosphere she's trying to create. He half-smiles, the way he does when he's silently laughing at her, and pulls her down to lie on her side, facing him.

There's a long moment where he just lies there, looking at her. She can feel his breaths puffing onto her cheek. He has such beautiful eyes, she reflects not for the first time; there's something about the cool color of them that fits his angular face so well. The grey-blue of the Maine coast sea and sky.

"So," she says after he's been quiet a while. 

"Shh, Parker." He closes his eyes for a moment. She thinks he might be trying to remember the dream. Then, very gently, he reaches out his hands, one to the back of her neck and the other to her waist. He draws her close, tucking her into his body, and presses her face down until it's buried in his shoulder. 

Huh, interesting. Audrey obligingly noses her face into his neck, which is a little prickly with the day's growth of beard. He blows out a long, low breath; she thinks for a second how new it must still be for him to feel her heat against him, the solidity of her presence there, the little shifts of skin against skin where her lips touch his pulse and his fingertips press into her biceps. Speaking of ability to feel, it is  _ very warm _ . 

"Like this," he says, less like he's explaining to her and more like he's confirming for himself. He holds her there for a long minute, until she can feel their chests rising and falling in rhythm together (not fully synced, because his ribcage is huge and he needs approximately one breath for every two of hers, but in intersecting sine waves, meeting at regular times). It's sweet and comfortable, and Audrey is starting to get sleepy with it when Nathan finally shifts. "And then…" he mumbles, still working through it, and Audrey starts a little in surprise when both hands cup the sides of her face and draw her up. 

It's a clumsy kiss, and she realizes it's because Nathan had his eyes closed before their lips even met. She doesn't know why that gives her a shock of fondness right through her chest, but it does; she laughs a little back in her throat, can't help it, and takes it upon herself to angle her head so his nose isn't quite so in the way. He holds stock-still, overwhelmed and somehow shocked despite being the one who initiated it: it reminds her of their first kiss months ago, before they had this Barn and deadline hanging over them, when she thought,  _ oh, this is what people mean, this is what they're talking about: this one _ . 

She wants to roll them over so she can be on top, cover Nathan up with her body, but she remembers just in time that that's not the point tonight and holds still. It's a good instinct, because the next moment Nathan makes one of his groaning noises in his chest (Audrey loves the drama of those noises, it's like Nathan has been tested  _ beyond what he can bear _ by making out. Flattering, sexy, kind of hilarious: the Nathan Wournos Specialty) and his hands settle onto her waist and pull her even closer, until her face is back in his shoulder again and she's straddling his thigh. 

"Oh," she says, a little surprised, as his hips shift against her and his hands urge her to grind back. Yeah, okay, she gets it thanks; she picks up the rhythm before he needs to guide her a second time. 

It feels vaguely nice, in a general friction-is-good sort of way, but she's not super into the position at first. She can't see Nathan's face, which she always likes to be able to do during sex, and she feels kind of silly squirming around on his thigh for the right kind of angle and pressure. But then, all at once, the image of what Nathan is re-creating hits her like a bolt of incredibly arousing lightning:  _ Duke _ tucked into his neck like this, hips shifting and working, rolling in that sinuous way she's seen him do when he's dancing. Nathan's hands splayed across Duke's back and side just like this, large even on his frame, holding him in and down and making him twist and writhe and work for his pleasure--

Suddenly Audrey likes this position  _ just fine _ . 

She gasps out some kind of little noise into his shoulder, and in response his whole body shudders. Audrey kind of wants to whisper something to him to see if she can get him even more worked up, but she doesn't want to break up his fantasy. And the opposite instinct, to try to imagine Duke in this situation even more fully and really try to play the part, feels like crossing a line. So instead she just shifts so that her leg presses a little more firmly against the hard bulge in his pajama pants, and lets him move nice and forceful against her. She's probably not going to come like this, but it's good anyways, the solid shoves hitting her clit just right to send shocks up her spine every time. 

She can actually hear Nathan's heart thundering between them. He gasps a little, a quick gulp of air, and then wraps a hand around the base of her neck and pulls her face, somehow, even more into his neck. She squirms a little so her nose isn't mashed into his jaw, and just barely catches the whisper into her hair:

"I've got you. I've got you, I--you're--with me-- _ Duke _ ." 

His hips shove against her a couple more times, jerkily, and then still. 

Oh. Oh, wow.

Nathan is protective towards her, has been ever since the first indication of feelings between them. She likes it when she's shaky and needs him to be solid and safe, but the rest of the time it's annoying. Mostly because she figured it was a gender thing; that as much as he respects her strengths and expertise, he still sees her as someone to be protected because she's a woman. 

With this one desperate whisper, though, all of that has been thrown into question. She's starting to think this protective thing, for Nathan, might actually go a whole lot deeper than some unexamined sexism. 

She thinks back, and helpfully, her brain provides a range of snapshots to choose from. Nathan covering Duke's face with his own arm, shrugging with his usual 'can't feel it anyways' blandness when they have to pick splinters out of his skin later. Nathan yelling 'get down!' and yanking Duke to the ground with him, body shielding him from above. Nathan pulling Duke back from a cliff edge, knuckles white and clenched on his shirt. Nathan telling her, again and again, that they don't need Duke on this case, his presence is inappropriate, he's not reliable, they shouldn't call him. Nathan telling Duke--rudely--to leave because he's not useful; because this is a serious (dangerous) situation and it should be left to the police. 

It's one of those moments when a trail of evidence slots together in Audrey's mind like puzzle pieces, clear meaning shining through. 

Nathan would never in a million years try to protect Audrey by being so rude to her that she'd leave. (He's tried to keep her out of things by lies of omission occasionally, but he's not very good at it, and she's an investigator by trade and by temperament, it's usually a pretty doomed endeavor.) She thinks she can be excused for not noticing until right now that that appears to be what he's been doing with Duke. 

A feelings dream was  _ goddamn right _ . How many times, Audrey wonders as Nathan's breathing slowly evens out against her, has he thought about keeping Duke safe, much less just plain  _ keeping _ him? 

While she's still thinking, Nathan slowly draws back and rolls out of bed. He changes his pants and lobs the wet pair into the laundry pile, but doesn't lie back down immediately; instead he pauses at the edge of the bed, looking down at her with a hesitant and somewhat guilty face.

"It'd be pretty hypocritical for me to be mad at you," she offers. He relaxes a little, but still looks wary, which means he doesn't get it yet. "I mean it, Nathan. I feel the same--no, maybe not the same exactly, but...just as strongly. Just as much." She's getting tripped up. She hates this, how she can't find the right words, how feelings are so much harder to pin down and examine than evidence is. "This is...I don't think it's a minor thing. For either of us."

"No," he confirms, heavily, and sits back down on the bed finally. "What...do we do?"

She didn't have a plan until he asked, but Audrey  _ does  _ know what to do, she realizes. "We'll talk to him. Just….talk. No pressure, right? Again. We'll just see."

"...okay," Nathan agrees, jaw squared like he has to already tense up about it, and Audrey sighs, pulls him back down beside her, and starts seeing if she can't get him to at least marginally relax again.

So of course the next day, Duke gets kidnapped. 

It's Jordan who alerts them, marching her way into the station and right into Nathan's office with a level of determination that gets everyone out of her way. She isn't wearing the gloves any more, but she's kept the leather jacket. Audrey has to admit, it's a look that works for her. 

"Jordan, what are you doing here?" Nathan says, rudely. He stands from his desk as if he's getting ready to herd her out of his office, and Audrey scrambles to her feet to prevent that eventuality because nothing good can come of it.

"This is a police station. I'm here to report a crime." Her voice snaps less than it did two weeks ago; already, the jagged-sharp energy of her is smoothing out into the steadier confidence she always carried underneath. Audrey never liked Jordan much, but she's happy for her, for this ending to her story.      


"Go ahead, what happened?" Audrey says, pulling a blank incident report form towards her, because this is in fact a police station and they do in fact know how to follow procedure. 

"Some Guard members got wind of the cure and didn't want to wait their turn," Jordan says. Audrey puts the form back with a sigh: another one for the off-the-books approach. 

"Did you tell them?" Nathan asks, eyes intent.

"No." She scans his face and frowns. "Believe what you want, I don't have to justify myself to you. I didn't."

"I believe you." Audrey does. She's got the measure of Jordan, now, knows how she looks when she lies. Nathan doesn't have the distance for that yet, and may never acquire it, but that's okay, Audrey will cover him. Here, as in everything, she's got his back. "What happened? What did they do?"

Jordan bites her lip, and Audrey experiences a sudden premonition of the 'oh shit' variety. It isn't like Jordan to hesitate.

"They've got Crocker." 

Nathan's head comes up in a jerk, suddenly on full alert. Under Audrey's hand, the discarded form crumples as her fists bunch. 

"Where." It doesn't sound like a question so much as a barked order; Nathan is already at his chair, pulling his gun belt and jacket on. 

"And how many." Audrey is only a step behind.

"Two, they've got him in one of our halfway houses a bit out of town. They didn't know I was cured, they offered to cut me in. I can draw you a map."

"Good, do it. Parker, stay with her, I'll put together the assault team." Nathan makes for the door.

"Send me Dwight!" Audrey yells after him through the flurry of motion, paper and pencil in front of Jordan and her radio crackling to life with the call to assemble a hostage rescue team. 

Dwight comes thundering in, on alert but not caught up. 

"Duke's a hostage, Nathan's got the team. Two hostiles, Guard. Jordan?" 

"It's Mike Reynolds and Frankie Webster," Jordan says. Dwight groans.

"Are they armed?" Audrey asks. 

" _ Constantly _ ." Dwight does not sound enthused. Great, guns rights activists, her  _ favorite _ .    


"So, Dwight, you're not going through that door until they're disarmed-- _ this _ is why we should have cured you already, by the way--Jordan, thank you, but now--"

"Yeah, I'm out, I get it. SWAT isn't my style, anyways." Jordan makes for the door, then pauses. "Also, you?" She points at Dwight, who backs up a step with what appears to be wholly instinctive self-preservation. "Stop tailing me and ask me out like a normal person, you have my goddamn number."

Audrey stares at Dwight, eyebrows raised, only to see him grin and duck his head, completely unrepentant.

"Yes ma'am," he drawls, and Jordan gives him a  _ look _ , like he's pushing his luck but like she's also kind of into it. Audrey sees it, all of a sudden, their study in contrasts and similarities, the easiness between them that Jordan doesn't seem to have with anyone else, not even Nathan. The way that they used to stand at opposite corners of the room, not because they wanted to be far apart, but because that way they could each watch half of it in wary teamwork. The way they don't do that any more; they stand parallel, now, ever since Jordan was cured, like they're trying to understand that it's finally safe to approach. They're not going to be much for public displays, she can tell, but it's not subtle how Jordan's mouth is just starting a smile as if it's despite her better judgement, and how Dwight has raised his chin just enough to be both challenging and a little bit inviting, expectant. Their eye contact holds for a moment longer, then breaks.

"Don't get shot," Jordan orders, and slams out the doors. 

Audrey whistles, long and impressed. "Jordan's not the only one who plays her agenda close to the chest, huh?" she says. Dwight looks unabashed.

"Wasn't an agenda. There was a non-zero chance she might have been a security risk."

"Oh, right." Audrey rolls her eyes. There was a much larger non-zero chance he'd wanted to keep an eye on how she was adjusting and do that whole 'I know you can take care of yourself but I want to make sure you're safe because I'm a Man and that's how we Express Feelings' bit. Audrey is very familiar with that from her own tall, repressed, monosyllabic Havenite. 

She wants to needle Dwight more, as punishment for his subterfuge but also because it'll be funny to try to make him blush, but first they should probably go rescue her other, also tall but less repressed, Haven boy. 

The safehouse turns out to be a barn. (Audrey is seriously considering declaring the entire building category of barns, generally, to be her personal nemesis.) It sits on an otherwise empty plot of land, no farmhouse or even crop silo, which Audrey finds baffling in her city girl way, but also useful in that their approach is clear.    


Haven still doesn't have a SWAT team, but the incident response team, half police and half former military "volunteers", is well-trained. They listen as Nathan lays out the plan and flank the structure with commendable stealth. With Audrey and Nathan in the frontal assault team are Lt. Tanner, and a Marine who's a regular at the Gull (and whose name Audrey will remember soon, she swears).

As they get close she can hear Duke's voice, bullshitting like his life depends on it which hopefully it no longer does. 

"--what I'm telling you, fellas, I would love to help you out with your little and I'm-sure-it's-a-perfectly-good-size problems, but I can't. No can do. Don't got my tools, don't got the right timing, the position of the  _ stars _ \--"

He hasn't told them about Noelle. Well of course not, he's only been kidnapped and held for about five hours, it takes more than that to break Duke Crocker. 

Audrey claims the privilege of kicking down the door this time, just so she can be the first one to see him. Duke grins at her through a bloody lip; he's not the most beat to hell she's ever seen him, but there's still an extra bite in her "Police! Down on the ground, hands behind your head!" bellow.    


Duke, of course, sits back like the arrest is a show she's putting on for his enjoyment.

"Hottest cavalry I've ever seen."

She can't help it, she smiles. "Harsh, Nathan is right here."

"Aw, he knows he's a close second."

Duke winks at Nathan as he goes to cut him loose. Nathan rolls his eyes. 

"Can y'all not flirt while arresting us? Kinda weird," one of the kidnappers grumbles as Audrey cuffs him. She frowns. 

"Guess who's no longer in a position to be making demands? Oh, hey it's you! The guy who kidnapped our Duke! Shut up and enjoy the knowledge that we're going to cure you  _ before _ we incarcerate you."

That does shut them up, and it isn't until after the op is over and they're lingering outside the house, trying to gently force Duke to go to the hospital, that she even realizes what she said. 

"So. 'Our' Duke, huh?" Duke is still prodding at his rib bruises mournfully. He says it with studied casualness. 

"What?"

"That guy. I affectionately nicknamed him Dickbreath while he was interrogating me. You told him he'd kidnapped...no, you know what, never mind."

He flaps a hand, again very casual, every line of him screaming 'forget it.' She hears it now, though, the echo of what she said. God, for just once in her life could she not blurt out everything she's thinking?

Audrey makes a face, and then screws her courage to the sticking place. 

"Well. Actually. We. I mean, me and Nathan, we had a...conversation."

"A conversation," Duke repeats. He clearly can't tell yet whether he's going to be insulted or amused, and his tone is wavering in between them. 

"Yeah. Hey, Nathan!" She waves him over. He arrives at a jog, his hair a little messy from where he's been running his hands through it and forgotten to fix it. It's one of those moments where her love for him reaches up and tries to strangle her lungs, and she just hopes to hell this doesn't screw everything up. 

She meets his eyes, tilts her head a little towards Duke. He looks at her like she's insane. 

"You want to do this  _ now _ ?" he asks, and Duke looks so utterly stunned by the indication that she's not just messing with him that it firms her resolve. 

"Yeah. Yeah I do."

"...okay." Nathan turns to Duke and hits him with the raised-eyebrows-ducked-head combo look which, Audrey can testify, is fairly lethal. 

"Nate--" Duke starts, weakly. 

"We should have dinner." It's Nathan's only pickup line, but it's the way he says it that makes it effective, the way he puts all the hesitation and all the feelings it took to overcome that hesitation right into his tone. There are years of history in Nathan's voice, the weight of them heavy in his gaze, and Duke blinks as if he's feeling them as a physical blow. For a moment Audrey thinks she can see their entire story spooling out behind them, the rise and fall of it, very private and very large at the same time. 

"Dinner," Duke echos blankly. 

"Yeah, you know, where you. Eat food." 

"With...your friends?"

"With your p. Part. Ners?" Nathan stumbles  _ hard _ on 'partners', and that's what finally convinces Duke, she can see it. The Nathan Wournos Stutter is pretty unequivocal. 

"Holy shit," Duke says, and sits down abruptly on the hood of the Bronco. Audrey goes with him, presses their legs together reassuringly, and he stares at first her face and then the line of her thigh against his like she's an alien. Then he stares at Nathan, who is fidgeting. Then he stares at Audrey again. Finally, like the sun coming out from the clouds, he grins, and Audrey  _ melts _ inside at how young and delighted and excited he looks, and how Nathan makes a horribly awkward face in response. "Holy  _ shit _ . Is this just because I got kidnapped? And, follow-up question, how often can I get kidnapped before this stops working?"

Audrey shakes her head. "We started talking about it before this. We were--"

"Parker don't tell him that!" Nathan yelps, and Duke's eyes go very wide and then very, very intent. 

"Keep taking Audrey."

"Oh, I will. At dinner. My place, eight?" There's always been a charge between her and Duke. She knows what it is, of course, but she hasn't ever really tried to coax it out into the open until now. When she meets his eyes, though, there it is, hot and heavy between them, making her breath feel sticky in her throat. 

Nathan makes a noise, and this is not going to screw up  _ anything _ , this is going to be  _ amazing _ , because she's only ever heard that noise before while they're actively having sex. 

"Dinner. Your place. Eight," Duke says, in that way he has where the surface meaning of the words is almost completely dissolved by other kinds of communication, the soft heat of his voice and the ocean-dark swell in his gaze. Their eyes are holding and Audrey is overheating, sweat at her throat and sweet fire in her stomach. This eye contact may, in fact, be inappropriate for the public. 

Duke comes to the conclusion right as she does, apparently, because he blinks once and then, with a deliberately smug tilt of his jaw, looks away at Nathan. Audrey looks at Nathan too, and if she thought Duke was staring...lord. Nathan's regard is like a laser, like a solid thing with its own mass that she can feel. Duke swallows. He knows the power of Nathan's gaze, she's aware, in fact spends most of his time around him provoking it, but he's getting what he asked for now and he looks...caught. Surprised and pinned down by the weight of Nathan's full, undivided attention. She knows the feeling.    


"Don't…" Duke clears his throat, tries again. "Don't let her cook, okay?"

"Agreed," Nathan says. He tones his eyes down to something a little below the blatant 'undressing your soul' level. Audrey thinks she might be disappointed. 

"Hey, I can cook," she protests, very belatedly. 

"You can't," they both say in unison, which is just  _ unfair _ .

"I see how it is now. Ganged up on," she grumbles. Nathan chokes on air; Duke grins, sharp and insinuating.

"If you want."

Okay, Audrey has to get them out of this situation before she ends up doing some really unprofessional things on the hood of Nathan's truck in front of the entire police force.

"RIGHT," she says, loudly, and hops off the Bronco. "Thanks for that...debrief." Duke looks like he's going to laugh again. Nathan kicks his foot. "Why don't you go with Detective Wournos to the hospital. Mr. Crocker." Now Nathan's laughing at her. Fine. See if she saves him next time  _ he _ has the urge to climb into Duke's lap in public. 

"Sure thing, Detective Parker." Duke is grinning, hugely, and is definitely making fun of her, but she can't be mad at him because he looks so stupidly  _ happy _ . "Detective Wournos, you gonna help me get checked out?"

"Sure am." Ugh, the Nathan Wournos Sex Smile has made its appearance, the sappy gentle grin he gets when he's happy about the world and his place in it particularly re: orgasms. Unfair. Audrey nods to him, sharply, and goes to supervise crime scene cleanup because otherwise she's going to get into that car with them and none of them are going to make it back into town with their virtues intact. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for being patient! I wanted to work in this new scene, because @queenbookwench was right, it totally belongs in this story. 
> 
> Two chapters with this update, to make up for some of the delay!

Apparently Vince Teagues is the leader of the Guard. Audrey, Nathan and Duke learn this abruptly when he shows up at the station to discipline his wayward members and to demand answers about the cure. It's such a twist of her understanding of him and Haven that Audrey spends several minutes just glaring in confusion at Vince (while Duke shouts a lot about people trying to kill him) and trying to understand.

She knew he and Dave were in the middle of the whole thing with the Troubles, she's known that from the start. It's just that she assumed their involvement was more...intellectual. If you'd asked her to point to the guy who was the secret leader of the well-armed national network of shadowy Troubled militia, she wouldn't have chosen the cranky old man in the argyle sweater whose Twitter account was 80% rants about grammar and who thought hunting was morally wrong.

It does make things go more quickly after that, though. The Guard fall into line almost eerily once their leader confirms that the cure is real and no one who doesn't want it has to have it; Audrey didn't even think about people who liked their Troubles, had never really considered it a possibility since all the ones she's seen have been devastating, but there are definitely members who were banging down Dwight's door demanding assurances that this cure wasn't mandatory. It isn't, though Audrey is interested to see what happens the first time two family members disagree about whether to keep their Trouble.

As the days continue to tick down towards the Hunter meteor storm, Haven starts to change. Audrey didn't think she'd be able to see the effects of the Troubles cure so soon, but she _can_ . Walking around town, there are fewer and fewer pockets of tension; fewer and fewer places where she can see the scars of _something_ , quickly covered up and bundled behind closed doors. The ones that are left are more obvious now, and she takes to knocking on the houses and business where she senses that special something, and telling people with a gentle look of understanding that if you're having a problem, the Haven PD has a solution. Yes, a real one. Permanent.

A lot of folks cry when she says that, even though they won't ever acknowledge out loud what she's talking about.

For the most part, formerly-Troubled folks are pretty good about not being too obvious about what has happened, but Audrey, Duke, Nathan and Dwight do get invited to a suspiciously not casual "dinner with friends" in which everyone just _happens_ to be, or be related to, someone who has visited the morgue in the last month or so. There are some very thinly veiled toasts made.

(Dwight and Jordan also go home together from that party, which makes Audrey punch the air in glee. "You know, you're kind of a matchmaker," comments Duke while Nathan is still looking like he doesn't know how to feel about his best contractor dating his ex. "Of course I am, I'm nosy," says Audrey.)

It's beautiful, seeing these hidden parts of Haven emerge from the ashes and start, tentatively, to flourish for the first time in hundreds of years. People start inviting their relatives to visit. People start _taking vacations_.

It doesn't escape Audrey's notice that suddenly Haven's streets get a lot less overwhelmingly white, too. No one she spoke to has ever brought this up before before, but in retrospect it's obvious: most of the Troubled families in Haven are Native. Purely by historical fact they would have to be; Haven was Tuwiowok first, after all, and there were plenty of other Penobscot, Mi'kmaq and Abenaki towns within a week's walking distance, far before the encroachment of British and French colonies.

This fact comes into clear focus when the Benton sisters come to be cured. Dwight drives them back into town, three young women piled into his truck, wide-eyed and worryingly thin. When they troop together into the morgue, Duke drops his syringe and starts backing away, hands waving.

"Nuh-uh, nope. No kids."

"He's right, we agreed: they're too young to consent to a medical procedure like this," Audrey says. She feels a hand on her back, and takes a deep breath, pressing her lungs back towards Nathan's fingers. She doesn't know how he always knows when she's upset, but it's true that Amelia's round, innocent face is bringing back memories of the mess Audrey's shotgun made of the Rev's chest.  

She doesn't regret it, not for a moment. And seeing how Amelia has grown--her hair is shorter now, in one of those asymmetrical cuts that are apparently cool these days, and she's apparently into arm warmers as a fashion statement--just reminds her all over again that she made the right call. Driscoll's life for this kid's? No question.

"I'm twenty." Frankie rests her hands on little Sophie's shoulders and raises her chin. "And I'm the only adult in this family. You have to cure us, cure _me_."

"Listen that's _noble_ and all but if you think for a second I'm going to--" Duke starts, and then winces when Sophie's eyes go very wide and reels himself back in. His voice when it comes out next is very soft. "I can't hurt you, kid. Not even if you're the only option."

Audrey nudges Nathan until he goes to stand next to Duke instead, no hand on the back but tip of his shoe casually bumping his ankle, a silent reassurance. Duke acknowledges it with a twitch of his mouth, halfway between annoyed and grateful the way he often is when reminded that they care.

"I'm not a kid." Frankie says it with such implacable authority that one can't really help but believe her. She's taken care of her younger sisters for almost a full year now, all on her own, Audrey remembers. No wonder she speaks like someone used to being in charge. "And I'm old enough to know that I don't want to hurt anyone. We _deserve_ to be able to live our lives and not have to hurt anyone."

Duke resists for a long, long moment. Audrey sees the war of it inside of him, the part of him that knows who he is and the lines he will and won't cross at direct odds with the part that can never ignore a plea for help.

Amelia's stomach growls, that long, gurgling sound Audrey remembers so vividly from the forest.

" _Please_ ," Frankie says.

Duke's hands clench, hard, at his sides, and then loosen.

"Get them out of here, they shouldn't watch," he says, abruptly, not looking at anyone. It takes them all a moment to realize that he means the younger sisters, at which point Amelia, who has been completely quiet since she arrived, jerks her head up in a wave of dark hair and snaps, "I'm not leaving!"

"He's right, you shouldn't--" Audrey starts, and Amelia growls, long and low and very clearly a predator's sound.

"I'm. Not. Leaving."

"Okay. But you don't want to watch," Dwight says, calm but very firm. He holds out his arms and Sophie runs from Frankie's grasp into his, burying her face instantly into his shoulder as he hoists her up. As Frankie squares her shoulders and goes to sit on the bed, Amelia looks between her and Dwight anxiously, eyes starting to brim with tears, and then all of a sudden rushes to Dwight and hides her face in his other shoulder as well. "It's okay, it's going to be okay," Audrey can hear him whisper to them.

Duke has turned his back on the room to go prepare his syringe. Nathan goes with him; Audrey hears his soft, almost too kind, "Let me," when Duke's hands shake too much to fill the morphine.

Audrey, meanwhile, crosses over to Frankie, who looks pale and determined and exhausted.

"You're being very brave," she says. Frankie's lip trembles, and then firms again.

"You can't be nice to me, I'll cry," she whispers.

Yeah, Audrey can relate to that feeling. She takes Frankie's hand, which clutches back.

"It's okay if you cry."

The first tear drips down Frankie's cheek almost before Audrey is done saying it, as if she was only waiting for permission. She shoots a quick, anxious glance at her sisters, and when she realizes they can't see, the tears come faster, until she's choking in little sobs.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Keep going. Please. Don't--just ignore it, I'm just scared," she hisses at Duke when he stops, frozen, at the sight of her tears. 

"It won't hurt," Audrey offers, and Frankie lets out a wet laugh.

"That's not what I'm scared of." She wipes her face several times, with both hands, and when she looks back up, her eyes are on her sisters again. Her next words are whispered, clearly trying not to let them hear. Audrey, Duke and Nathan all lean in. "You're sure it's going to work, right?"

"Uh, yeah, pretty sure." Duke blinks a few times. "...is there some reason it might not?"

"Because...b-because...listen our mom was Inuu, okay? You know the "wendigo" story the way white people tell it, but it's not...they're not _redeemable_ monsters. They're...rotten. At the core. They're everything decaying and sick in the world. People use them to represent _colonialism_. What if that's….us? What if all those stories come from us? I don't think you can cure that."

"You're good people, Frankie. You're just...afflicted," Nathan starts, but Duke puts a hand on his arm and he quiets, looking to him.

"Frankie, the stories aren't about you and your family." Duke's speaking quietly, to make sure the other two Benton sisters can't hear, but his voice is clear and steady. He sure doesn't look like he's lying, and Audrey's pretty sure she has a handle on his tells by now, but how can he possibly know that?

Duke sneaks a glance at Audrey, quirks a tiny smile as if he knows what she's thinking, and then goes on.

"I've got a bunch of notebooks on the Troubles. Goes back a long way, long enough that I'm pretty sure they go almost to when they started...in the 1600s. How long have the Inuu been telling those wendigo stories?"

"I-I don't know. Hundreds of years. Way before then," Frankie says. Duke nods.

"Yeah. I'm pretty sure you're not the cause of them. However your family got this Trouble, it's not meant to be part of you. Trust me, I know about thinking your Trouble says something about you as a person, or even that you're supposed to want it, because it's part of your heritage. That's bullshit." Nathan grins, sudden and huge, when Duke says that, and Audrey kicks him in the shin because while they're both very proud of him for that realization, now is _not_ the time to discuss it. Nathan kicks her back, reproachfully, but stops. Duke ignores them.

"You're not a mythological creature, Frankie, you just got dealt a really, really shitty hand. Let me fix that, okay?"

"...okay." Frankie sits back, and though she keeps clutching Audrey's hand, her eyes are clear. She watches Duke as he positions himself behind her, and then she turns forward again and closes her eyes, waiting. The needle goes in. Audrey catches her body as it slumps and lays her carefully on the table. She spares a glance for where Dwight is still holding the sisters, both of whom are now wiping running eyes--and in Sophie's case, nose as well--on his shirt, and then turns to Duke.

"We'll stay right here until she wakes up," she says, and he looks at her in surprise. He's trying to pull his smile back on, but it's faltering and failing as she watches.

"Yeah, let's...let's do that," he says, and lets her hold his hand as he sits down to watch over Frankie until sunset.


	6. Chapter 6

It's worth it, if she disappears now, Audrey thinks as the last days before the Hunter tick down. She's not going to say that out loud, of course, and she's still going to do everything she can to stay...but if there's really no way, if this is it for her, then it's worth it. Something deep inside her, right at the core of her being, feels eased. Like a nagging noise that's been grating on her nerves for her entire life is slowly quieting.

Of course, that deeply fulfilled feeling might also have something to do with the fact that she is getting laid like _crazy_. Benefits of having two devoted, attentive partners: all of the orgasms. Just, all of them.

Audrey has had to amend her theory of people's hidden selves and sex: she's now realizing that there's something alchemical about it, a reaction between people coming together that lends each of them a unique tone that they might not have in bed with someone else. She is different with Duke than with Nathan, and different again with the both of them at once, in ways she wouldn't have predicted. She couldn't have foreseen how much more they laugh when it's the three of them; how she and Duke can get weirdly competitive about making Nathan scream, and how the two of them gang up on her with this mixture of worship and wickedness.

Circumstances matter too, though. The night before the Hunter meteor storm they try to pretend things are normal, but their touches are frantic no matter how often they try to slow down. Nathan won't let Audrey go the entire time, making for some weird acrobatics to actually allow them to have sex, and Audrey can't stop herself from ringing a line of bruised bites around Duke's collarbones. Those will take days to fade; there will be marks left of her presence, guaranteed, even if she…

Yeah. Anyways.

In the morning Nathan tries to have the stupid fight about her staying inside all day again, even though he's lost that argument twice already. Audrey ignores him as she gets ready for work. He doesn't even try to be subtle about dogging her footsteps; he even follows her into the bathroom to brush her teeth, which is weird and annoying but there's a rising ringing in her ears and an emptiness in her head that pre-empts her objections.

When they come out of the bathroom Duke is waiting in the kitchen. He hands her a brown paper bag.

"Uh…?" she says, taking it. He quirks a sideways smile. She wishes that sad, bitter smiles didn't look so much more practiced on his face than joyful ones.

"Have a good day at work, Officer Parker."

"Have I suddenly lost the ability to buy myself lunch, or…?"

"Never know. I bet the food in outer space is crap." She wrinkles her nose, and goes to open the bag. His hand stills her. "Don't. It's just in case, okay?"

"...okay." Just in case of what, he isn't going to say. Some day they're going to have to talk about how they don't talk about things. Well assuming "some day" is in the cards, even.

Audrey packs the lunch into her shoulder bag. Nathan is suspiciously quiet and accommodating on their drive to work, and she realizes why when she goes to sit at her desk and realizes that he has clipped an actual, literal monitor bracelet to her belt. As if she's a felon.

"Seriously?"

She raises her eyebrow at him, shifting the damn thing out of the way so she can sit down. He raises his right back at her.

"Dunno what you're talking about."

" _Nathan_."

"It's just one day Parker."

"Nathan!"

"What? You want me to not do everything I can think of? You want me to leave options on the table, when it might be the difference between getting you back and not?" he demands, and she can't argue after that, not with the strained thread of his voice and the wildness in his eyes.

The meteor storm starts around 10am. Audrey thought they'd be hard to see with the sun out, but they aren't; she didn't realize they'd be so _close_. Each one makes a wooshing, crackling noise as it passes overhead, and soon people are out in droves, with cameras and telescopes, watching and pointing.

At noon they get a dispatch call that a bunch a teenagers have taken the opportunity of the meteor storm to cut class, get wasted, and light shit on fire out on one of the little islands that ring the bay. Audrey rolls her eyes and clips her whistle to her belt as she gets out of her chair; the whistle, she's found, is much more likely to get attention while not causing panic, because it makes her sound like a lifeguard and all Haven kids have been well-trained to obey nautical authorities at all times. 

She gets outside to find Nathan already in the driver's seat of the Bronco. At this point she's resigned himself to his dogging her steps all day, so she just rolls her eyes and allows it. They commandeer their usual police business boat from Beadie, a little dinghy the harbormaster keeps around for dock maintenance and exactly these kinds of situations, and enjoy a short, quiet ride across the bay. This island is within sight of the lighthouse, which winks at Audrey conspiratorially as it comes into view around a bend. Behind it rises Kick 'em Jenny Neck, where Audrey Prime lost her memories. There's a layer of fog coming in off the sea, so it's barely visible in the distance, but for a moment Audrey swears she can see…

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense.

They dock their boat next to the speedboat one of the kids clearly 'borrowed' from their parents, and make their way towards the sound of laughter and the crackle of fire. There are six teenagers in the clearing, sprawled around a bonfire and surrounded by empty beer bottles and the contents of someone's liquor cabinet. At the blast from Audrey's whistle they all shriek, but no one takes off running, thankfully.

"Okay, party's over!" Audrey calls, and a chorus of groans and expletives rise. Ah, the joys of small town policing.

"Can we fit them all in one boat?" she asks Nathan. He bites his lip, which she takes as a silent 'no, but I really don't want to admit that'. "Okay. I'll stay here with a couple of them, and you can come back for us."

"Parker…"

"I will stay within sight of the children at all times, okay? Literally will not leave the clearing. Happy?"

"...fine," he grumbles, then nods at a couple of the kids. "Harley, Adrian, Katie, you're with me. No one's parents are getting called until you sober up, but that's only if you cooperate on the ride back, you hear me?"

A ragged, dejected chorus of "yes officer Wournos"s follow them out of sight. Audrey bites her lip on a smile; she's learned by now that Nathan is a favorite among Haven's troublemaking teens, due in part to a surprising willingness to run interference between them and their authority figures at home. She wonders what the story is there, why Nathan seems to understand so well that sometimes all a kid needs is someone on their side.

She really hopes to stick around long enough to ask him that.

Audrey, on the other hand, Does Not Understand The Youth. She turns back to the three under her charge, and sighs.

"Okay, we're on cleanup duty. Come on, let's put out that fire, first of all."

They all go off into peals of laughter. Yeah, this is gonna be a fun half hour until Nathan gets back.

To Audrey's surprise, when someone does come back into the clearing, it's Officer Tater, not Nathan. She's managed to get the fire doused and the still-giggling teens to pick up most of the discarded bottles in the meantime, so she's able to send them with him pretty quickly.

"Where's Nathan?" she asks as they reach the boats.

"He got held up by a parent. He said you could come in the boat with us, though," Tater offers as he loads the kids in. Audrey is pretty sure Nathan's wording was more of a "must" than a "could". She rolls her eyes.

"I may not be a Havenite, but I can pilot a speedboat back to the dock. I'll be fine, officer. Go ahead."

"Yes ma'am."

She sees them off, and then fires up the speedboat. Out on the water by herself, ears full of the roar of the engine and face full of spray, it's surprisingly calming. The lighthouse comes back into view and she nods to it professionally, one Haven institution to another.

And then her boat hits the shore of Kick 'em Jenny Neck, when she didn't pilot it there at all.

...fuck.

Audrey considers trying to leave, and discards it. She seriously doubts that, even if she points her boat directly away from this island, she's going to end up anywhere than directly back on this shore.

Well, if it's time for this confrontation, then she's going to it eyes open and ready, not trying to run away. She kills the engine, gets out, and starts walking, uphill. She doesn't know where the Barn was, last time, but she has a sense she doesn't exactly need to.

Audrey crests the top of a hill and the trees clear out suddenly into an open meadow. The Barn _is_ there, even though it should have been visible from the trees and wasn't; she supposes optics are the least baffling aspect of the damn thing. She stares at it, feeling her heart start to beat faster as she begins to wonder if this is it, if this is the moment where she, for all intents and purposes, dies.

The door creaks open. Agent Howard steps out, plants his hands on his hips, and takes a deep breath of the fresh Haven air.

"Are you an alien?" Audrey says, which she is fully prepared to blame on Duke and his wild conspiracy theories.

"No." Agent Howard smiles at her with a lot more tranquility than he ever displayed when she thought he was her boss, and strides across the clearing to a circle of pine logs, where he sits. He gestures for her to do the same; she declines, though she does holster her gun.

"I think you owe me a whole bunch of explanations," she says.

"What do you want to know?" There's a fire pit and a kettle in front of him. There was definitely not one the last time Audrey looked, but now it seems like it was always there. She blinks, shakes her head, looks again. Agent-Definitely-Not-Actually-An-Agent Howard calmly takes the kettle off the fire that _was not a fire two seconds ago_ and pours himself a mug.

"What are you?" says Audrey.

"An administrator." He blows on the cup.

"Would it actually hurt you if it was too hot? Wait, no, that's not what I care about." Okay she sort of cares. Does he feel pain? Can he be hurt? ...is she actually thinking about hurting him? Can she really justify that, for a man who's done nothing wrong? "What do you administrate?"

"You." He smiles, inscrutably. Audrey's qualms about considering hurting him shrink dramatically. "Your existence. Your lives, if that's how you want to consider them."

" _If_?" The thought of not considering herself as alive makes Audrey feel like she wants to throw up. Howard looks at her steadily, aware of her distress but completely cold to it, and it's that steady regard, weirdly familiar, that finally, finally clues her in.

"I'm a bad person." It's ridiculous that it took her this long, really. She's in law enforcement. She should have recognized how Howard looks at her much earlier. "The real me, I mean. You're my parole officer." He opens his mouth; she shakes her head, sharply. There's a sinking despair settling into her stomach and leaking into her spine. She knows she's right. There's something inside of her that knows this fact, that she is _bad_ , on a level of certainty she's never known anything else. "I did something horrible, didn't I."

"...you did," he admits. She knew it was coming, but it still hits her hard. She blinks rapidly, tries to control the water that wants to well up.

"And I'm being punished."

"No." That surprises her. When she looks up, the genuine passion, the _belief_ , in his face surprises her more. "You're being rehabilitated."

"By losing everything, again and again? Are you _serious_?" It's not the worst rehab program she's ever heard of, but it's pretty close. "What the hell did I do?"

"I can't tell you that." Of course. Of course he can't. "What I can tell you is that, if you go into the Barn, the Troubles will leave."

"And I'll die."

"Audrey Parker will be gone, yes."

"Okay." Audrey takes a deep breath, shakes her head hard. The revelation of who she really is, deep down, has messed up her original plan. She wanted to bargain for her memories back, but now that she has the chance, she's pretty sure that's the worst possible thing she could do. That's okay, though. Who needs memories? She has a life. "Just one problem there: we're curing the Troubles."

"So it seems," says Howard. He's looking at her oddly, searchingly. Like he can see something inside her eyes or aura or whatever, and he's trying to get at every little detail of it.

"So if I don't go…"

"Then the Hunter meteor shower will destroy Haven."

" _What_?!" she yells. A bird caws from the woods, startled. "Are you _fucking kidding me_?!"

"I am not." His tea or coffee or whatever is cooled down, apparently, because he takes a long sip, still looking at her with that quiet, steady gaze, peaceful but utterly without compassion. Whatever she did, it was really bad. She can tell.

"What, is this some kind of _failsafe_? Just in case I defuse the Troubles, here's this backup ticking time bomb just to make totally sure I can't escape?!" Actually, that's pretty clever, honestly. Whoever designed this prison, they were smart. Smart and cruel.

"Not quite." Agent Howard gets to his feet, and dusts of his pants with brisk movements. His cup, and the fire, have disappeared. "It functions as that in practice, yes, but there's a more fundamental mechanism at work. While you are in the Barn, Haven cannot come to harm."

"...what."

"Think of the Barn as a tool for...amplifying energy." He gestures at it. Audrey looks from its cracked wooden exterior to him and back and tries not to make too skeptical a face. It's a fucking barn. "While you're inside it, it protects this town. When you leave, that protection cannot continue."

"So why let me leave at all?"

"Twenty-seven years of protection depletes you. You need to recharge."

"Recharge on what?" She's not a goddamn battery-powered flashlight!

"Love."

One word, and it silences her. It's the stupidest, corniest thing she's ever heard, but it still somehow snatched all the breath from her lungs. Half of her is snarling with rage, hackles up, crushing close to her and guarding jealously the love she has waited her whole life to feel and now finally does, not just for Duke and Nathan--but oh, so much, so very much for her kind, strong, sweet boys--but for everyone, this whole damn town, for Vince and Dave and their secrets and Maggie and her dignity and Laverne and her warmth and Tater and Jess Minion and Bobby and Maryanne and every single person who has a hidden Trouble or a weird little antique shop or coaches a peewee sports team or leaves passive-aggressive notes on tourists' cars.

The other half is letting go.

That's the thing about love. It gives itself away. You don't get a choice about that part.

"I'll go." She hardly recognizes her own voice when it comes out. She's never really heard what defeat sounds like on her before.

"Even though the Troubles are being cured." It's not quite a question, but she answers it anyways.

"Even though. Congratulations. Your jail still works." She takes a step towards the Barn. Her feet feel very heavy, and she has to stop and take a deep breath before she can take another. She thought she would feel free, when she finally made the decision, when she finally met her fate. She doesn't. She feels like she's making a horrible mistake.

This is going to kill Nathan.

God, she can't think about that.

Duke will leave. He'll pick up and leave Haven.

Stop stop stop.

She's at the doors now. Howard comes up behind her shoulder. They both stare at the rusted latch.

"Is James in there?"

"Yes."

"Oh." It's a breath of air, punched out of her. Her son. She's going to see her son. But she won't remember his father. And she won't get to see Duke's daughter, she won't...they were going to…

Goddammit Audrey, _do not cry_.

"What's going to happen? You know, when I…"

"It won't be instant. It won't happen until you're ready."

She's not sure if that makes her feel better or not.

"Okay." She pulls open the door, and steps inside.


	7. Chapter 7

The walls are pure white. The light is just soft enough not to hurt her eyes, but everything blurs anyways, the endless blank hallways stretching out past what her vision can process. The fact that the barn is bigger on the inside than the outside doesn't surprise her; what does is how much it looks like an empty rat maze, like a video game before the textures are loaded. 

"James?" she calls. Her voice doesn't echo, as if the walls aren't actually made of a material that can reflect sound. It's eerie. 

"Lucy?" She whirls around, and there he is. He looks about five years younger than her, in his twenties. He's tall, and his clothes are too short for him, they show the bones of his wrists and his sensible white socks.

He looks like Nathan. Oh, he looks so much like Nathan that it  _ hurts _ .    


"It's, uh, it's Audrey this time," she says. He frowns a little, looks wary. 

"Do you know who I am?"

"I do." She smiles back, helplessly. "Are you all right? Vince and Dave, they said that you were all but dead when Lucy called the Barn for you..."

"What?" That skeptical look is very Nathan, too. It sends a sharp ache all through her, thinking of never seeing Nathan wrinkle his brow up like that again. "That's...is that really what happened? Lucy called the Barn for me?"

"That's what I heard?" She can't know for sure, of course. Audrey takes in her son's face, which is moving from suspicion to just plain confusion. His posture is relaxing from wary to open. Whatever he heard about that incident, it made him scared of  _ her _ . That's odd. 

"And you don't know anything else about what happened to me? Who tried to hurt me?"

"No, I'm sorry. Just that Lucy called the Barn in order to save you, and then, well...after that there was no Lucy any more, I guess."

"To save me…" James trails off, frowning at something Audrey can't see, then shakes his head. "I believe you. I just...I wish I could ask Lucy some things, now."

Instead of this stranger with his mother's face. Audrey winces. "I'm so sorry."

"No!" He takes a quick step forward. His arms come up under her elbows, it's an almost-hug that feels so natural and yet so unfamiliar at the same time that she's stunned. She's never been touched like this before, not as a friend or a lover but as a son.  _ She is his mother _ . She didn't know one touch could matter so much. "Please don't say that. It wasn't--isn't--your fault. I am so, so happy to meet you, Audrey."

"So am I." Her voice catches. To be here, with her son, she could make herself stop regretting what she's losing, she's pretty sure. 

Speaking of losses…

"James, Arla is dead. She...she was Troubled, and it got the better of her. I'm sorry." He closes his eyes for a long moment. There's the resemblance to her, that she was looking for and couldn't find. She can see it now, in how he swallows and then moves on.

"I knew I probably wouldn't see her again, but...god. She deserved better." She didn't. But it's better this way: Audrey will forget this lie soon enough, and Arla can rest knowing that one person still loves her, at least. 

"There's one more thing I have to tell you, before...before I'm not Audrey any more." 

"What is it?"

"I know who your father is." Disbelief, and then joy, light his face. The resemblance to Nathan hits her all over again. When she forgets, will she even understand how precious that smile is? "His name is Nathan."

"Is? Not was?"

"He's alive. He's from this time...it's a long story. What matters is that he disappeared, before Sarah had you...but he knows about you, now. He wishes he could have met you."

"What is he like?" Audrey is so familiar with the longing that colors James' voice. That yearning to know anything, just anything, about where, and who, you came from. 

"He's brave, and kind. And a huge dork. He loves pancakes and baseball and fancy coffee and scented candles. We. Uh. We have another partner, Duke; he and Duke have been friends since they were little, and they fight all the time, but they're always there for each other."

His eyebrows go up. Audrey waits, slightly nervously, for the reaction. Not every day you hear your mom tell you she and your dad are banging another dude. Eventually James grins, bigger and broader and much easier than Nathan does. He raises his hand for a high five. 

"Go Audrey!" She snorts with laughter, and slaps his palm. She has to go on tiptoes to do it, and that makes them both laugh harder. When the laughter fades, she feels clean inside, and quiet. Ready.

"I think...I think it's time." James presses his lips together, hard. Another Nathan expression.

"I still have so many questions…"

"I wish I had more answers." Welcome to her life. "Will you be here? While I'm, whatever? For the twenty-seven years?" 

"I don't know."    


"I'll ask. Howard!" she shouts. 

"Yes?" She fully expected him to just pop up, but instead he opens a door in one of the blank white walls and steps through. That's actually kind of hilarious. Though she may just be grasping at anything funny right now. 

"Will I be with James, while I'm in the Barn?" 

"He'll be here. But you won't see him. You'll be living a new life." James takes a step back, alarmed; she misses the warmth of his hands on her elbows, the way he cupped them with such a new, different affection. 

"Can't I be a part of it? Give me new memories too, I don't care."

"James, no!" God no, she wouldn't wish this awful process on anyone, much less her child. 

"That is possible, yes." Howard looks at her evenly. She glares. 

"But we won't know each other, or what we really are to each other, will we?"

"No."

"It's not worth it. No, James,  _ it's not worth it _ . Take it from me: losing everything, losing the life you've built, again and again...it's worse than dying." She holds his gaze, deadly serious, until he finally presses his lips together and nods. "Instead, while I'm gone, I want you to try to figure out a way to heal yourself. You deserve to live in the real world. Promise?"

"...I promise." 

"Good." She reaches out and squeezes his hands, then steps away fully.  _ Dear Duke _ , she thinks, wishing she could send him this thought somehow,  _ I hope it's like this for you when you meet Jean. It's amazing. I hope you get to feel this way, because it's one of the best things I've ever felt. _     


That's when she realizes: there's one more thing she has to do before she goes. 

"Just a second," she tells Howard. He nods. 

"The meteor shower will start to hit Haven in twelve minutes." Great, awesome, thanks for that time limit, asshole. 

"This won't take long." She pulls her shoulder bag in front of her and digs inside it. Notebook, tissues, handcuffs...there it is. Duke's packed lunch is a little squashed from a full day at her side, but it's intact. She unrolls the top and opens it up. 

Her breath catches. 

Inside the bag is Duke's compass from the Cape Rouge. She didn't even know the thing detached; it's hung above the dashboard every time she's been on the boat. He has much more sophisticated navigation instruments, of course. When she asked him why he needed a handheld compass too, he rubbed his finger along the lid with a smile and said sometimes you needed to hold north in your hand. 

She pulls it out of the bag. It fits right into her palm. Underneath is a folded up piece of paper, covered in Duke's messy scrawl. 

> Audrey --
> 
> Nate's got a plan to try to keep you from getting lost. Hope it works. Just in case, though, want you to have this. 
> 
> Go do what you have to do. If anyone can and then find their way home, it's you. 
> 
> Don't know if this will make any difference. It never has before. But:
> 
> Please come back.
> 
> \-- Duke 

Her hand clenches on the compass, so hard she feels the edge of it bite into her palm.  _ Please come back _ . Her throat closes; the breath sticks in her chest and pulses there, aching. Her heart thuds so loudly she can feel it in her eardrums. 

Audrey knows that, once again, Duke has reached inside of himself and given her something, something that cost him dearly. She feels it: feels the years of learning not to say those words, learning that they did no good, that Duke disregarded to pen them to her. This is what love is for her: to understand what something like that means to someone, what deep, raw, bloody parts of themself they dredged those words up through. This is what love is for Duke: to excavate, to reinvent, to hope that, despite all evidence, this time will be different. 

Meteor shower be damned. She will answer that hope or die trying.

"I'm not going." Her voice sounds odd to her, a strangled, rough thing. 

"Then you are willing to let the sky fall on all of Haven," Howard proclaims. 

"No." She shakes her head, hard, and lets that clear the water from her eyes. There's a steady beating core of resolve inside of her now, and she knows it well: every time she solves a Trouble, it feels just like this. "I'm going to find another way."

The banging on the door of the Barn startles all three of them; James jumps a little, and even Howard flinches. 

"Parker! PARKER!!" 

Audrey knows that bellow. She can't laugh, not when Nathan sounds so gutted, so despairing, but she smiles, and she's halfway to the door when it slams open and Nathan stumbles inside.    


"Oh thank God," he breathes when he sees her, and seizes her in a hug that's almost too tight, but not quite. Nathan never hugs too tight, now that he can feel. "It's still you."

"Still me," she confirms, squeezing him back. It's funny what you focus on about a person after the possibility of losing them has been raised in your mind; Nathan is so warm, and she digs her fingers into his back and thinks that, if she'd gone, she would always have been a little bit cold without him. 

After a long moment of holding each other Audrey manages to extricate herself, though he keeps hold of her hand tightly and she can't bring herself to mind. "Nathan, I--"

"If you're going, I'm going too." He set his jaw in that perfectly, ridiculously stubborn way he has, looking first and her and then at Howard with pure determination in his gaze. "This Barn is not leaving without me."

"Nathan." She feels it inside of him, this endless well of dedication. She doesn't even know how he found the Barn, but she's realizing that there's quite possibly nothing he wouldn't do to be with her. Again, it hits her: this is love. 

And with that understanding comes a revelation.

"The Barn amplifies my energy, right? That's what protects Haven?" She knows the answer, but she's just checking. 

"Yes it does," says Howard.

"Yeah. Nathan? Come here," she says, and draws him in with one hand. He goes--would go anywhere she led him, she knows that now, and it's an almost frightening amount of power. She holds Haven in the palm of her hand and that's somehow less intimidating a responsibility than this man's heart. 

"Parker, what--" he starts. 

"Don't worry, I've got this," she says, and kisses him. 

It's hard for Audrey to feel things fully, most of the time. Hard for her to feel safe enough to let her guard down, yes, but also just hard for her to accept that, if she gives in to the full magnitude of something, she could be overwhelmed. The scope of her emotions is always something she's tried to gently steer clear of. It's a lot easier to help other people work through their feelings, and she gets a measure of catharsis from that process, as if things are getting resolved inside of her by proxy. But that won't cut it now, and she's scared, all of a sudden. It's not easy to just...change her mind all of a sudden about how much she's willing to let go.

Nathan squeezes her hand, roughly, and she remembers that the same could be said for him. That at various times, with various levels of intention, she's bulldozed right through his careful systems of repression to satisfy her own curiosity, or necessity, or affection. He's let go again and again for her. So has Duke. 

She draws in a short, sharp breath, most of it Nathan's air stolen from between his lips. She squeezes the compass in one hand and his fingers in her other. She feels the storm of how terrifyingly, amazingly, wonderfully she loves them rise in her throat, and she lets it happen, lets it fill her up to her eyeballs, up to the limit of her skin and then out, past,  _ beyond _ .

She doesn't expect the explosion. It's massive, a wave of pressure that seems to break  _ through  _ her skin and at the same time a concussive impact of sound, so powerful her hair flys outwards and then plasters itself to her face. Behind her James and Howard cry out; Nathan staggers but keeps his footing. Audrey draws back from him, blinking, half expecting the walls of the Barn to be flattened around her. 

They aren't, but they are shining, the previous blank white of their surface replaced with a shifting rainbow of colors. It's like a more flamboyant Northern Lights, and in the lights she sees snatches of images. That's the Haven Herald, right there, with Dave and Vince staring out the windows, mouths open; there's the police station, officers scrambling to and fro; and there's the lighthouse, with a huge chunk of burning rock heading right for it before that same concussive wave that she felt hits it and it just….dissolves. She stares. All over Haven, if these walls are to be believes, meteors that were bearing down on people's homes and loved ones have melted into thin air, like they never were.

"I thought the power of love was going to be a little more subtle," Audrey says, faintly. 

"Given that it came from you, I don't know why you thought that," says Nathan.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it! Thank you everyone so much who has engaged with this story as I've posted it, you're wonderful and I can't say enough how happy I am that you've enjoyed it.

Agent Howard is giving Audrey a very familiar look: it's exactly the same face he used to make when she caught a serial killer but somehow managed to get herself banned from Tampa Bay, Florida in the same evening. She knows now that these memories are fake, invented to bridge the time period between when the Barn cloned Audrey Parker Prime's memories and when it dropped her back in Haven, but she still feels the same mixture of amusement, pride, and a certain rueful, 'well, what did you expect when you assigned this job to me?' sort of acceptance.

"It won't hold for long. I'd be surprised if you get even a year out of that protection," he says at last.

"Anything to stop me from calling the Barn up again when it does and doing this exact same thing?" Audrey asks. Howard's mouth twists in distaste, which is answer enough. "Aw, don't be mad I beat your jail system, sir. Let's talk instead about the new terms of my parole."

"Jail system?"

"Parole?"

Nathan and James speak at the exact same time, and then share a startled look that, on both their ends, shifts to stunned recognition as they see themselves in each other's faces. 

"Is this…?" Audrey nods, and James cautiously comes closer to his father, eyes searching his face greedily. Nathan opens his mouth, but can't seem to quite figure out what to do from there. 

"I didn't mean to leave," he gets out at last, all in a rush, stumbling over the words. "If I'd known. I mean. I. I didn't--" His voice chokes off as James takes two quick steps forward and flings his arms around him. It's been several weeks since Nathan froze up under a new sensation, but his whole body stutters again now, overwhelmed, before his arms slowly rise and crush James to his chest, one clenching in the back of his jacket and the other finding the back of his head.

"I missed you," his whispers, gutted and honest, into his hair. "I didn't know, but I missed you anyways."

Audrey bites her cheek, trying not to cry, and has to clear her throat twice before she can turn to Howard. 

"Is there any way to take him with us?" she asks. Howard looks sympathetic, which is a welcome surprise: she hopes he won't make James pay for her past self's mistakes. 

"His place is here now." 

"But--"

"He lost something vital inside of him when he was attacked. The Barn's environment replaces it, enough that he can live, but outside...he would die. Within the day. I'm sorry."

"Dammit." Audrey looks back at James and Nathan, talking softly now, completely focused on each other. Her heart aches. "You're sure there's nothing you can do?"

"Me, no. There are those who might be able to, but I promise, you don't want them here." Audrey isn't sure what that means, beyond the pretty clear conclusion that she's going to have to leave her son behind.  _ Damn  _ it.

"Time won't pass for him. It will be like five minutes between now and the next time you meet," Howard offers. That's something at least. They have plenty of time to figure out how to fix this problem, and in the meantime, James won't be sitting in this horrible white place alone for too long. 

"Okay." She nods and turns to look at Howard, studying the tired lines of his face. "So, now that you know I'm not staying here, let's make a deal."

"A deal?" he arches an eyebrow. She half expects a severe, 'I'm your superior, Agent Parker, how dare you speak to me this way,' but it doesn't come. "What kind of deal?"

"I think you could decide to make life pretty difficult for me, if I go back," she guesses. He doesn't dispute her. "On the other hand, correct me if I'm wrong, but you can't actually stop me, can you? You're not authorized to keep me here by force." A slight incline of his head. "So, it's in both of our interests to come to some kind of arrangement. How's this: I will come back to the Barn, here, exactly a year from today. You'll check to make sure  _ whatever  _ you're trying to 'rehabilitate' me from isn't backsliding." She still honestly isn't sure what the point of him and this whole Barn setup is. "And if I'm still doing well, I give you another 'temporary' protection boost, and then I leave again. Sound fair?"

"Hm." Howard is doing that thing again, where he studies her face so intently she's pretty sure he's looking at something she can't see. Then, very deliberately, he extends a hand. His grip when she shakes it is firm. "You've got a deal, Agent Parker. One year. Let's see what you do with a bit more leeway."

"Well, I'm going to cure the Troubles, for one thing."

"That will be something to see." He releases her hand. She inclines her head, with a lot more respect for him than she started today with, and turns to James and Nathan. 

"We can leave, but you can't," she tells James. Nathan's jaw clenches, but their son just nods. 

"Yeah, I kinda had a feeling that was it."

"I'll be back, though. Very soon, from your perspective." 

"Really?" A huge smile breaks over his face, and wow, he looks nothing like either of them when he smiles like that. "Are you sure? Is that safe for you?"

"It is. And when I come back, we're going to get you out of here too. We'll find a way," she promises. 

"Never doubted it." His arms envelope her. She's never going to have that moment of realizing how tall her son suddenly is, never going to get weepy because the small being she held in her arms is now so big she only comes up to his chest. But she's going to know this man as a person, at least. She's going to learn who her son is, what he thinks about the world, what his dreams and ambitions are. That, she will know. That, she'll get to feel. She hugs him back fiercely, until he grunts with the force of it.

"I'll see you soon," she promises again, and his eyes only shutter a little with unshed tears.

"We both will," Nathan promises. She takes his hand, and they leave the Barn behind them.

They're about halfway down the hill towards the beach when they meet a furious Duke coming up the other way. 

"Jesus Christ!" he exclaims when he sees them, hair a sweaty mess over his forehead and arms shining with exertion. Two long strides bring them back together, and he shoves at Nathan's shoulder with that particular annoyed relief he gets whenever they're back after another ill-considered adventure. "What the  _ hell  _ kind of voicemail was that, Nathan, you scared me half to death with--"

He stops, abruptly, because Audrey is hugging him. Her arms stick to his shirt a little--she thinks he must have been running uphill, to be this gross, and that thought just adds to the bubble of helpless, grateful warmth inside her. 

"It was you," she tells him. He blinks down at her, uncomprehending. "I came back because you asked me to."

She sees it take a moment for the realization to dawn in his eyes, for him to really get what she's telling him. She watches shock and amazement chase each other over his face, and then he crushes her to him, arms tight around her and face buried in her hair. His chest heaves against her once, a huge breath that might well be a sob, and then the air goes out of him completely, shoulders dropped. His weight falls on her. She doesn't stumble, just holds him up, happy and honored. 

Duke is always trying to give. She's so glad to be able to give him something, for once. 

"Let's go home," Nathan says, unexpectedly softly, and Audrey's just starting to nod her head enthusiastically because she almost died today, even more 'almost' than the other days in her regular life where she also almost dies, and she could really go for some pajamas and ice cream and a silly musical movie and a Duke Patented Footrub--

\--when Duke makes a little coughing sound, wipes his eyes, and then smiles very...oh dear, very charmingly. 

"What?" Audrey groans, because, seriously? Disintegrating meteors with the power of her love wasn't enough for today?

"Well, uh, when I was coming to get you guys, I...ran into someone."

He turns and gestures back down to the beach. Audrey squints, and then rubs her eyes and squints again. Bobbing in the water next to the Rouge is a dark head, too big to be a seal. As the three of them approach, she recognizes it as Cole Glendower, damp hair plastered to his head and broad face as serious as when he walked into the sea. 

"We felt that, down below!" he calls when they reach the beach. "Whatever you did...is it over?"

"Sort of," Nathan answers, which honestly is the least helpful conversational route he could have chosen. Audrey and Duke both roll their eyes, and try unsuccessfully to pretend it isn't with fondness. 

"What I just did was temporary, but we do have a cure. Permanent and no side effects," Audrey tells Cole, and though his expression doesn't change, the creases around his eyes deepen with intense scrutiny.

"You're sure."

"Pretty sure. We can…" She pauses. Everywhere it is possible to feel exhaustion in one's body, she feels it. Duke is scanning the horizon, as if it's going to help him process all the feelings still surging in his eyes. Nathan hasn't let go of her hand this whole time.

"You know what? Come back tomorrow." Cole's eyebrows shoot up. So do Duke's. Audrey shrugs. "Not to be rude, but...you've lived underwater this long, you can take another day, right? Not to mention you've got to get everyone down there close enough to dry land that they don't all drown when you're cured. So...come back tomorrow. We'll…"

She pauses. Duke is grinning at her with unbridled delight; Nathan is biting his lip, with that expression that means she's surprised him and he loves it. Around them, the sun is setting on the sea, and she can hear the calls of birds and the slip of waves on the beach. 

Somewhere deep inside of her there may be a darkness, something worth punishing or in need of rehabilitation. But Audrey doesn't feel that. She feels her lungs draw in air, tinged with the salt of the sea, and she feels her eyes crinkle at the corners, helplessly happy, when she looks at her partners and her town.

"We'll be here."


End file.
